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PORTRAITS 



OF 



EMINENT AMERICANS 



NOW LIVING: 



WITH 



BIOGRAPHICAL AND HISTORICAL MEMOIRS OF THEIR 
LIVES AND ACTIONS. ^ . 



BY JOHN LIVINGSTON, 

OF THE NEW-YORK BAR. 



I N T-W O VOLUMES. 
VOL. II. 



NetD-^ork: 

CORNISH, LAMPORT & CO., 8 PARK PLACE, 

C0nb0n: 

SAMPSON LOW, SON & CO. 

1853. 



<■ v.- 



Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1853, by 

JOHN LIVINGSTON, 

In the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the United States for the Southern 

District of New-York. 



i 



In compliance with current 
copyright law, LBS Archival 

Products produced this 

replacement volume on paper 

that meets the ANSI Standard 

Z39.48-1984 to replace the 

irreparably deteriorated 

original. 

1991 

— ^ TM 

(00) 






TO 



GABRIEL WINTER LIVINGSTON. 



Mr Dear Son, 

As I can scarcely expect to be here when you shall have reached the 
age of maturity, I dedicate to you the second volume of my Biographical 
Work, as a memorial of my desire for your advancement in learning, 
and not without the hope that some of the examples it contains will 
incite you to the pursuit of that wisdom which may enable you to con- 
fer many benefits on your friends, your country, and the whole race of 
mankind, and lead you so to behave yourself as to give the world 
no cause to regret that you ever were born. 

Remember that, as honor is due to those only who dare to associate 
with pain, and have trampled pleasure under their feet, so oblivion, if 
not disgrace, awaits such as allow their hearts to be enslaved by the 
charms of enervating and inglorious ease. Nothing can exempt a 
man from labor, who desires to distinguish himself, and it is a folly to 
aspire to a superior character, without a superior virtue and industry 
to support it. Honorable distinction is not to be obtained by idle 
vows and supplications ; and when people give themselves up to sloth, 
it is in vain for them to pray for that success which awaits those only 
who are active, vigilant and provident. I trust, therefore, the time 
which so many other young men bestow upon their sports or trifling 
diversions, or the lazy indolence of a luxurious life, you will studiously 
employ in the acquisition of knowledge ; so that, if I shall be permitted 
to approach the limit assigned to man's earthly pilgrimage, you may 
add happiness to the declining years of 

Your affectionate Father, 

JOHN LIVINGSTON. 



f 



CONTENTS. 



NAMES OF SUBJECTS CLASSIFIED ALPHABETICALLY. 



[Page. 



ANDERSON, SAMUEL, of Murfreesboro', Tennessee, 
Lawyer, Judge of the Circuit Court for the 5th Circuit, 
vol. ii 419 

AYER, RICHARD H., of Manchester, New-Hampshire, 

Manufacturer, President of the Amoskeag Bank, vol. i. 113 

BADGER, LUTHER, of Binghamton, New-York, Lawyer, 

formerly Member of Congress, vol. ii. . . . . 505 

BARRINGER, DANIEL M. of Cabarras County, North 
Carolina, Lawyer, formerly Member of the United States 
Congress, now Minister to the Court of Spain, vol. i. . 51 

BATTLE, WILLIAM H., of Chapel Hill, North Carolina, 

Lawyer, Judge of the Superior Court, vol. ii, . . 771 

BIDDLE, HORACE P., of Logansport, Indiana, Lawyer 
and Author, President Judge of the 8th Judicial Circuit, 
vol. i. 257 

BOWLES, JOSHUA B., of Louisville, Kentucky, Fi7iancier, 

President of the Bank of Louisville, vol. ii. . . . 645 

BOWMAN, JAMES L., of Brownsville, Pennsylvania, Mer- 
chant, President of the Monongahela Bank, vol. i. . 357 

BRIGHAM, JOSIAH, of Quincy, Massachusetts, Merchant, 

President of the Quincy Stone Bank, vol. i. . . 31 

BROWN, AARON V., of Nashville, Tennessee, Lawyer, _ 
late Governor of Tennessee and Member of Congress, 
vol. i. 89 

BROWN, SAMUEL A., of Jamestown, New-York, Lawyer, 

formerly Member of the New-York Assembly, vol. i. . 53 

BULLOCK, WILLIAM F., of Louisville, Kentucky, Lawyer, 

Judge of the Circuit Court for the 6th Circuit, vol. i. . 283 

BURNET, JACOB, of Cincinnati, Ohio, Lawyer, late United 
States Senator and Judge of the Supreme Court of Ohio, 
vol. i. ......... 265 

CAMPBELL, JOHN C, of W^heeling, Virginia, Physician, 

President of the Northwestern Bank of Virginia, vol. i. 161 

CATRON, JOHN, of Nashville, Tennessee, Lawyer, Justice 

of the Supreme Court of the United States, vol. ii. . 805 

CHURCH, LEONARD, of Lee, Massachusetts, Paper Manu- 
facturer, President of the Lee Bank. vol. i. . . . 35 

CLARKE, WILLIAM B., of Hagerstown, Maryland, Lawyer, 
Member of the House of Delegates in 1844, and Senate 
in 1846, vol. i 299 



VI C0NTBNT3. 



[Page. 



CLAY, JOHN RANDOLPH, of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, 
Diplomatist, Charge d' Affaires of the United States to 
Peru, South America, vol. i 133 

COLT, JAMES B., of Saint Louis, Missouri, Lawyer, Judge of 

the Criminal Court of Saint Louis, vol. i. . . . 149 

COOPWOOD, THOMAS, of Aberdeen, Mississippi, Lawyer 

and Planter, vol. ii. ...... . 631 

COXE, RICHARD S., of Washington, D. C, Lawyer, vol. i. 247 

CULVER, REUBEN, of Logan, Ohio, Lawyer, President 

of the Logan Branch Bank, vol. i. .... 95 

CUTLER, PLINY, of Boston, Massachusetts, Merchant, Presi- 
dent of the Atlantic Bank, vol. i, .... 327 

DARBY, JOHN F., of Saint Louis, Missouri, Lawyer, Member 

of the XXXIId. Congress, vol. i. .... 333 

DEAN, GILBERT, of Poughkeepsie, New- York, Lawyer, 

Member of the XXXIId. Congress, vol. i. . . .339 

DEVENS, DAVID, of Charlestown, Massachusetts, Merchant, 

President of the Bunker Hill Bank, vol. i. . . . 21 

DE WITT, ALEXANDER, of O.Kford, Massachusetts, Finan- 
cier and Politician, President of the Mechanics' Bank at 
Worcester, Member of the XXXIIId. Congress, vol. i. 315 

DEXTER, S. NEWTON, of Whitestown, New-York, Mer- 
chant and Banker, President of the Bank of Whitestown, 
vol. ii. ........ . 819 

DIXON, ARCHIBALD, of Henderson, Kentucky, Lawyer, 

United States Senator, vol. ii. . . . . . 737 

DOBYNS, JOHN PORTER, of Maysville, Kentucky, Mer- 
chant. President of the Maysville Branch of the Far- 
mers' Bank of Kentucky, vol. i 7 

DOWNES, GEORGE, of Calais, Maine, Financier, President 

of the Calais Bank, vol. i , . 239 

DUTTON, HENRY, of New-Haven, Connecticut, Lawyer, 

Professor of Law in Yale College, vol. ii. . . . 687 

EAVES, NATHANIEL R., of Chesterville, South Carolina, 

Lawyer, Member of the Senate of South Carolina, vol. ii. 597 

EDMONDS, JOHN W., of New- York, Lawyer, Judge of the 

Supreme Court of N. Y., vol. ii 797 

EMMONS, H. H., of Detroit, Michigan, Lawyer, vol. ii. . 451 

FOGG, FRANCIS BRINLEY, of Nashville, Tennessee, Law- 
yer, Member of the State Constitutional Convention of 
Tennessee, in 1834, vol. ii. . . . . . . 667 

FOSTER, LA FAYETTE S., of Norwich, Connecticut, Laivyer, 
formerly Mayor of Norwich, and Speaker of the Con. 
necticut House of Representatives, vol. i. . . . 1 

FULLER, HENRY H., of Boston, Massachusetts, Lawyer, 

(deceased since the publication of his memoir,) vol. i. . 173 

GARLAND, HUGH A., of Saint Louis, Missouri, Lawyer and 

Author, vol. ii. ....... . 657 

GILMER, JOHN A., of Guilford County, North Carolina, 

Lawyer, vol. i 343 



COKTBNTS. VII 

[Page. 

GOODWYN, ROBERT H., of Columbia, South Carolina, 
Physician, Financier and Planter, President of the Bank 
of the State of South Carolina, vol. i. .... 193 

GORDON, GEORGE H., of Woodville, Mississippi, Lawyer 
and Planter, Delegate to the Democratic Convention of 
1852, vol. i • . . 45 

GOULD, JACOB, of Rochester, New- York, Merchant, formerly- 
United States Marshal for the Northern District of 
New- York, now President of the Farmers' and Mechan- 
ics' Bank, vol. i. 75 

GRACE, WILLIAM P., of Pine Bluff, Arkansas, Lawyer, 

vol. i. 323 

GRAVES, CALVIN, of Locust Hill, North Carolina, Lawyer, 

formerly Speaker of the House of Commons, vol. i. . 187 

GRIDLEY, ALBERT GALLATIN, of Clinton, New-York, 
Merchant and Banker, President of the Kirkland Bank, 
vol. i. 63 

GRIER, ROBERT COOPER, of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, 
Lawyer, Justice of the Supreme Court of the United 
States, vol. ii 813 

GRISWOLD, HIRAM, of Cleveland, Ohio, Lawyer, late Re- 

porter for the Supreme Court, vol. i. . . . . 373 

HALL, SAMUEL, of Princeton, Indiana, Lawyer and Farmer, 

formerly Lieutenant-Governor of Indiana, vol. i. . . 259 

HALL, WILLARD, of Wilmington, Delaware, Lawyer, Judge 

of the United States District Court for Delaware, vol. ii. 421 

HAMILTON, ALLEN, of Fort Wayne, Indiana, Financier, 

President of the Branch Bank at Fort Wayne, vol. i. . 275 

PIARPER, JOSEPH M., of Concord, New-Hampshire, Phy. 

sician, President of the Mechanics' Bank, vol. i. . . 107 

HARRINGTON, SAMUEL MAXWELL, of Dover, Del- 
aware, Lawyer and Author, Associate Justice of the 
Superior Court of Delaware, vol, i. .... 129 

HAYNE, ISAAC W., of Charleston, South Carolina, Lawyer, 

Attorney-General for the State of South Carolina, vol. i, 383 

HUMPHREYS, WEST H., of Nashville, Tennessee, Lawyer, 

Reporter and Attorney-General for State, vol. ii. . . 829 

HUNT, BENJAMIN F., of Charleston, South Carolina, Law- 

yer, vol. ii. ........ 401 

JANUARY, ANDREW M., of Maysvllle, Kentucky, Mer- 
chant, President of the Maysville Branch of the Bank of 
Kentucky, vol. ii. ...... . 445 

KEITH, CHARLES F., of Athens, Tennessee, Lawyer and 
Planter, Judge of the Circuit Court for the 3d Circuit, 
vol. ii 763 

KNOWLES, JOHN A., of Lowell, Massachusetts, Lawyer, 

President of the Appleton Bank, vol, ii. . , . 727 

LABAUVE, ZENON, of Plaquemine, Louisiana, Lawyer 
and Planter, Member of the Louisiana State Senate, 
vol. i II 



vm 



CONTENTS. 



[Page. 

LANDES, JOHN, of Lancaster, Pennsylvania, Farmer^ Pre- 
sident of the Lancaster County Bank, vo]. ii. . . 629 

LAWRENCE, WILLIAM, of Bellefontaine, Ohio, Zawyer, late 
Member of the State Legislature, and Supreme Court 
Reporter, vol. i. ....... 365 

LUMPKIN, JOSEPH HENRY, of Athens, Georgia, Lawyer, 

Justice of the Supreme Court of Georgia, vol. ii. . . 757 

MARCHBANKS, ANDREW J., of McMinnville, Tennessee, 
Lawyer, Judge of the Circuit Court for the 13th Circuit, 
vol. ii 563 

MARSH, MULFORD, of Savannah, Georgia, Lawyer, vol. i. 289 

MASON, WILLIAM, of Taunton, Massachusetts, Manufac- 
turer, President of the Machinists' Bank, vol. i. . . 13 

McCLURE, WILLIAM B., of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, Law- 
yer, Judge of the Court of Common Pleas for the 5th 
District, vol. i. ....... . 381 

McLEAN, JOHN, of Cincinnati, Ohio, Lawyer, Justice of the 

Supreme Court of the United States, vol. ii, . . 789 

MEEKER, BRADLEY B., of St. Paul's, Minnesota, Lawyer, As- 
sociate Justice of the Supreme Court of Minnesota, vol. i. 319 

MERRICK, PLINY, of Worcester, Massachusetts, Lawyer, 

Judge of the Court of Common Pleas, vol. i. ... 39 

MILLS, WILLIAM H., of Bangor, Maine, Financier, formerly 

Mayor of Bangor, Cashier of the Eastern Bank, vol. ii. 665 

MINER, HENRY J., of Fredonia, New- York, Merchant and 

Financier, President of H. J. M.'s Bank, vol. ii. . . 509 

NASH, JOHN W., of Powhatan, Virginia, Lawyer, Judge of 

the 2d Circuit Court, vol. ii. ..... 577 

NELSON, TPIOMAS, of Oregon City, Oregon, Lawyer, Chief- 
Justice of Oregon Territory, vol. ii. . . . . 559 

NORTON, GEORGE W.,ofRussellvi]le, K.QXit\xcky , Merchant, 

President of the Southern Bank of Kentucky, vol. ii. . 575 

ORR, JAMES L., of Anderson, C. H., South Carolina, Lawyer, 

Member of the XXXIId. Congress, vol. ii. . . . 393 

OVERTON, ARCHIBALD W., of Carthage, Tennessee, Law- 
yer and Planter, formerly on the Bench, vol. ii. . . 565 

PADDOCK, LOVLAND, of Watertown, New- York, Mer- 
chant and Financier, President of the Black River 
Bank, vol. i • ... 67 

PARKER, WILLIAM, of Boston, Massachusetts, Lawyer and 

Merchant, President of the Boylston Bank, vol. i. . . 23 

PATTERSON, ANGUS, of Barnwell District, South Carolina, 
Lawyer and Planter, late President of the State Senate, 
vol. i. ......... 387 

PERRY, BENJAMIN F., of Greenville, South Carolina, Law- 
yer, Editor, and Planter, vol. ii. . . . . . 581 

PHILLIPS, WILLARD, of Boston, Massachusetts, Lawyer, and 

Author of Phillips on Insurance and other works, vol. i.. 301 

PICKENS, EZEKIEL, of Selma, Alabama, Zaw^yeranrfP/an^cr, 
formerly Circuit Judge and Member of the Alabama 
Legislature, vol i 215 



CONTENTS. IX 

[Page. 

PILLOW, GIDEON J., of Columbia, Tennessee, Lawyer and 

Planter, Major-General in the Mexican war, vol. ii. . 691 

PIRTLE, HENRY, of Louisville, Kentucky, La^vyer, Chancel- 
lor of the Louisville Chancery Court, vol. ii. . . 731 

POMEROY, NOAH, of Meriden, Connecticut, Manvfacturer, 

President of the Meriden Bank, vol. i 243 

POPE, JOHN, of Memphis, Tennessee, Planter, President of 

the Union Bank, vol. ii. ..... . 623 

PRENTISS, SAMUEL, of Montpelier, Vermont, Lawyer, Judge 

of the United District Court for Vermont, vol. ii. , . 717 

PRINTUP, DANIEL S., of Rome, Georgia, Lawyer, Agent 

for the Bank of the State of South Carolina, vol. ii. . 443 

ROST, PIERRE A., of New-Orleans, Louisiana, Lawyer and 
Planter, one of the Justices of the Supreme Court of 
Louisiana, vol. i. ....... 121 

SAUNDERS, ISx-VAC, of North Scituate, Rhode Island, Manu- 
facturer, President of the Citizens' Union Bank, vol. i. . 79 

SMITH, WILLIAM R., of Fayette, C. H., Alabama, Member 

of the XXXIId. Congress, vol. i 207 

TALLMADGE, DARIUS, of Lancaster, Ohio, Financier, Pre- 
sident of the Hocking Valley Bank, vol. i. . . . 295 

TEALL, OLIVER, of Syracuse, New- York, Manvfacturer and 
Financier, President of the Onondaga County Bank, 
vol. i. ......... 101 

TURNER, JESSE, of Van Buren, Arkansas, Lawyer, vol. i. . 235 

WALKER, THOMAS A., of Jacksonville, Alabama, Lawyer, 

Judge of the Circuit Court for the Fifth Circuit, vol. i. . 225 

WALWORTH, REUBEN H., of Saratoga Springs, New-York, 

the last of the New-York Chancellors, vol. ii. . . 487 

WARNER, HIRAM, of Greenville, Georgia, Lawyer, Judge 

of the Supreme Court of Georgia, vol. i. . . . 255 

WARREN, LOTT, of Albany, Georgia, Lawyer, formerly 

Judge of the Superior Court, vol. ii. . , . . 747 

WHEELER, ALFRED, of San Francisco, California, Law^jer, 

Attorney for the United States in California, vol. ii. , 435 

WHITTEMORE, THOMAS, of Cambridge, Massachusetts, 
Clergyman and Financier, Editor and Author, Presi- 
dent of the Cambridge Bank, vol. i. .... 135 

WILLIAMS, ARCHIBALD, of Quincy, Illinois, Lawyer, U. 

S. Attorney for the State, vol. ii. .... 679 

WILSON, DANIEL A., of Lynchburgh, Virginia, Lawyer, for- 
merly one of the Judges of the General Court of Vir- 
ginia, vol. ii. ....... . 429 

WOODSON, DAVID M., of Carrollton, Illinois, Lawyer, 

Judge of the First Circuit Court, vol. ii. . . . 681 



CONTENTS. 

STATES CLASSIFIED ALPHABETICALLY. 
ALABAMA— [Page. 

EZEKIEL PICKENS, of Selma, Lawyer and Planter, for- 
merly Circuit Judge and Member of the Ala. Legislature, 
vol. i 215 

WILLIAM R. SMITH, of Fayette, C. IL, Lawyer, :Member 
oftheXXXIId. Congress, vol. i 207 

THOMAS A. WALKER, of Jacksonville, Lawyer, Judge of 
the Circuit Court for the Fifth Circuit, vol. i. . . . 225 

ARKANSAS- 
WILLIAM P. GRACE, of Pine Bluff, Lawyer, vol. i. . 323 
JESSE TURNER, of Van Buren, Lawyer, vol. i. . . 235 

CALirORNIA— 

ALFRED WHEELER, of San Francisco, Lawyer, Attorney 
for the United States, in California, vol. ii. . . . 435 

CONNECTICUT- 
HENRY DUTTON, of New-Haven, Lawyer, Professor of 

Law in Yale College, vol. ii 687 

LA FAYETTE S. FOSTER, of Norwich, Lawyer, formerly 

Mayor of Norwich, and Speaker of the Conn. House of 

Representatives, vol. i. ..... . .1 

NOAH POMEROY, of Meriden, Manufacturer, President of 

the Meriden Bank, vol. i 243 

DELAWARE— 

WILLARD HALL, of Wilmington, Lawyer, Judge of the U. 
S. District Court for Del., vol. ii. . . . . . 421 

SAMUEL MAXWELL HARRINGTON, of Dover, Law. 
yer and Author, Associate Justice of the Superior Court of 
Del, vol. i 129 

DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA- 
RICHARD S. COXE, of Washington, Lawyer, vol. i. . 247 

GEORGIA- 
JOSEPH HENRY LUMPKIN, of Athens, Laivyer, Justice 

of the Supreme Court of Georgia, vol. ii. ... 757 

MULFORD MARSH, of Savannah, Laivyer, vol. i. . . 289 
DANIEL S. PRINTUP, of Rome, Laiuyer, Agent for the 

Bank of the State of South Carolina, vol. ii. . . . 443 
HIRAM WARNER, of Greenville, Laiuyer, Judge of the 

Supreme Court of Georgia, vol. i. .... 255 

LOTT WARREN, of Albany, Lawyer, formerly Judge of 

the Superior Court, vol. ii. . . ... 747 



Xn CONTENTS. 

ILLINOIS— [Page. 

ARCHIBALD WILLIAMS, of Quincy, Lawyer, U. S. Attor- 
ney for the State, vol. il. 679 

DAVID M. WOODSON, of Carrolltou, Lawyer, Judge of 
the First Circuit Court, vol. ii- . . . . . 681 

INDIANA- 
HORACE p. BIDDLE, of Logansport, Lawyer and Author, 

President Judge of the Eighth Judicial Circuit, vol. i. . 257 
SAMUEL HALL, of Princeton, Lawyer and Farmer, for- 
merly Lieutenant Governor of Indiana, vol. i. . . 259 
ALLEN HAMILTOiN, of Fort Wayne, Financier, President 
of the Branch Bank at Fort Wayne, vol. i. . . , 275 

KENTUCKY- 
JOSHUA B. BOWLES, of Louisville, Financier, President 
of thd Bank of Louisville, vol, ii. . . . . . 645 

WILLIAM F. BULLOCK, of Louisville, Lawyer, Judge of 
the Circuit Court for the Sixth Circuit, vol. i. . . . 283 

ARCHIBALD DIXON, of Henderson, Lawyer, U. States 
Senator, vol. ii. ....... . 737 

JOHN PORTER DOBYNS, of Maysville, Merchant, Presi- 
dent of the Maysville branch of the Farmer's Bank of 
Ky., vol. i , .... 7 

ANDREW M. JANUARY, of Maysville, Merchant, Presi- 
dent of the Mavsville Branch of the Bank of Ky., vol. ii. . 445 

HENRY PIRTLE. of Louisville, Lawyer, Chancellor of the 
Louisville Chancery Court, vol. ii. .... 731 

GEORGE W. NORTON, of Russellville, Merchant, Presi- 
dent of the Southern Bank of Ky., vol. ii. ... 575 

LOUISIANA— 

ZENON LABAUVE, of Plaquemine, Lawyer, Member of 

the Louisiana State Senate, vol. i. . . . .11 

PIERRE A. ROST, of New-Orleans. Lawyer and Planter, 

one of the Justices of the Supreme Court of La., vol. i. . 121 
MAINE- 
GEORGE DOWNES, of Calais, Financier, President of the 

Calais Bank, vol. i. ....... 239 

WILLIAM H. MILLS, of Bangor, Financier, foimerly 

Mayor of Bangor, Cashier of the Eastern Bank, vol. ii. . G65 

MARYLAND- 
WILLIAM B. CLARKE, of Hagerstown, Lawyer, Member 
of the House of Delegates in 1844, and Senate in 1846, 
vol. i 299 

MASSACHUSETTS— 

JOSIAH BRIGHAM of Quincy, Merchant, President^of the 
Quincy Stone Bank, vol. i .31 

LEONARD CHURCH, of Lee, Paper Manufacturer, Presi- 
dent of the Lee Bank, vol. i 35 

PLINY CUTLER, of Boston, Merchant, President of the At- 
lantic Bank, vol. i. 327 



CONTENTS. XIII 

[Page. 

DAVID DEVENS, of Charlestown, Merchant, President of 
the Bunker Hill Bank, vol, i. ... - . 21 

ALEXANDER DE WITT, of Oxford, Financier and Poli- 
tician, President of the Mechanics' Bank at Worcester, 
member of the XXXIIId. Congress, vol. i. . . . 315 

HENRY H. FULLER, of Boston, Lawyer, (deceased since 
the publication of his Memoir,) vol. i. . . . . 173 

JOHN A. KNOWLES, of Lowell, Lawyer, President of the 
Appleton Bank, vol. ii 727 

WILLIAM MASON, of Taunton, Manufacturer, President 
of the Machinists' Bank, vol. i. . . . • . 13 

PLINY MERRICK, of Worcester, Lawyer, Judge of the 
Court of Common Pleas, vol. i. . . . . .39 

WILLIAM PARKER, of Boston, Lawyer and Merchant, 
President of the Boylston Bank, vol. i. ... 23 

WILLARD PHILLIPS, of Boston, Lawyer, and Author of 
Phillips on Insurance, and other works, vol. i. . . 301 

THOMAS WHITTEMORE, of Cambridge, Clergyman and 
Financier, Editor and Author, President of the Cambridge 
Bank, vol. i. ........ 135 

MICHIGAN- 

H. H. EMMONS, of Detroit, Lawyer, vol. ii. . . .451 

MINNESOTA— 

BRx\DLEY B. MEEKER, of Saint Paul's, Xawyer, Associate 
Justice of the Supreme Court of Minnesota, vol. i. . . 319 

MISSISSIPPI- 
THOMAS COOP WOOD, of Aberdeen, Lawyer and Planter, 
vol. ii. ......... 631 

GEORGE H. GORDON, oiWoodi\\\\e, Lawyer and Planter, 
Delegate to the Democratic Convention of 1852, vol. i. . 45 
MISSOURI- 
JAMES B. COLT, of Saint Louis, Lawyer, Judge of the 
Criminal Court of St. Louis, vol. i. .... 149 

JOHN F. DARBY, of Saint Louis, Lawyer, Member of the 

XXXIId. Congress, vol. i 333 

HUGH A. GARLAND, of St. Louis, Lawyer and Author, 

vol. ii. 657 

NEW-HAMPSHIRE— 

RICHARD H. AYER, of Manchester, Manufacturer, 
President of the Amoskeag Bank, vol. i. ... 113 

JOSEPH M. HARPER, of Concord, Physician, President 
of the Mechanics' Bank, vol. i. .... 107 

NEW-YORK— 

LUTHER BADGER, of Binghamton, Lawyer, formerly 

Member of Congress, vol. ii. . . . . . 505 

SAMUEL A. BROWN, of Jamestown, Lawyer, formerly 

Member of the New- York Assembly, vol. i. . . 53 

GILBERT DEAN, of Poughkeepsie, Lawyer, Member of the 

XXXIId. Congress, vol. i - 339 

S. NEWTON DEXTER, of Whitestown, Merchant and 

Banker, President of the Bank of Whitestown, vol. ii. . 819 



Xrv CONTENTS. 

[Page. 

JOHN W. EDMONDS, of New- York, Lawyer, Judge of 

the Supreme Court of New-York, vol. ii. ... 797 

JACOB GOULD, of Rochester, Merchant, formerly United 

States Marshal for the Northern District of New York, 

now President of the Farmers' and Mechanics' Bank, vol. i. 75 
ALBERT GALLATIN GRIDLEY, of Clinton, Merchant and 

Banker, President of the Kirkland Bank, vol. i. . ' .63 
HENRY J. MINER, of Fredonia, Merchant and Financier, 

President of H. J. M.'s Bank, vol, ii 509 

LOVLAND PADDOCK, of Watertown, Merchant and 

Financier, President of the Black River Bank, vol. i. . 67 
OLIVER TEALL, of Syracuse, Manufacturer and Financier, 

President of the Onondaga County Bank, vol. i. . . 101 
REUBEN H. WALWORTH, of Saratoga Springs, the last 

of the New-York Chancelors, vol. ii. ... 487 

NORTH CAROLINA- 
DANIEL M. BARRINGER, of Cabarras county, Lawyer, 

formerly Member of the United States Congress, now 

Minister to the Court of Spain, vol. i. . . . 51 

WILLIAM H. BATTLE, of Chapel Hill, Lawyer, Judge of 

the Superior Court, vol. ii. . . . . . 771 

JOHN A. GILMER, of Guilford county, Lawyer, vol. 1. 343 
CALVIN GRAVES, of Locust Hill, Lawyer, formerly 

Speaker of the House of Commons, vol. i. . . . 187 

OHIO- 
JACOB BURNET, of Cincinnati, Lawyer, late United States 

Senator, £^nd Judge of the Supreme Court of Ohio, vol. i. 265 
REUBEN CULVER, of Logan, Lawyer, President of the 

Logan Branch Bank, vol. i 95 

HIRAM GRISWOLD, of Cleveland, Lawyer, late Reporter 
for the Supreme Court, vol. i. ..... 373 

WILLIAM LAWRENCE, of Bellefontaine, Lawyer, late 
Member of the State Legislature, and Supreme Court Re- 
porter, vol. i. ........ 365 

JOHN McLEAN, of Cincinnati, Lawyer, Justice of the 
Supreme Court of the United States, vol. ii. . . . 789 

DARIUS T ALLMADGE, of Lancaster, Financier, President 
of the Hocking Valley Bank, vol. i. .... 295 

OREGON- 
THOMAS NELSON, of Oregon City, Lawyer, Chief Justice 
of Oregon Territory, vol. ii. ...... 559 

PENNSYLVANIA- 
JAMES L. BOWMAN, of Brownsville, Merchant, President 
of the Monongahela Bank, vol. i. . . . . . 357 

JOHN RANDOLPH CLAY, of Philadelphia, Diplomatist, 
Chargfe d' Affaires of the United States to Peru, South 

America, vol. i. 133 

ROBERT COOPER GRIER, of Philadelphia, Lawyer, Jus- 
tice of the Supreme Court of the United States, vol. ii. . 813 
JOHN LANDES, of Lancaster, Farmer, President of the 
Lancaster County Bank, vol. ii. . . . . . 629 



ooNTEirrs. XV 

[Page. 

WILLIAM B. McCLURE, of Pittsburgh, Lawyer, Judge of 
the Court of Common Pleas for the Fifth District, vol. i. . 381 

RHODE ISLAND- 
ISAAC SAUNDERS, of North Scituate, Manufacturer, Pre- 
sident of the Citizens' Union Bank, vol. i. ... 79 

SOUTH CAROLINA- 
NATHANIEL RIDLEY EAVES, of Chesterville, Lawyer, 

Member of the Senate of South Carolina, vol, ii. . . 597 
ROBERT H. GOODWYN, of Columbia, Physician, Finan- 
cier and Planter, President of the Bank of the State of 
South Carolina, vol. i. ...... . 193 

ISAAC W. HAYNE, of Charleston, Za?z'yer, Attorney-Gen- 
eral for the State of South Carolina, vol. i. . . . 383 

BENJAMIN r. HUNT, of Charleston, Lawyer, vol. ii. . 401 
JAMES L. ORR, of Anderson, C. H., Lawyer, Member of the 

XXXIld. Cong ress, vol. ii. 393 

ANGUS PATTERSON, of Barnwell District, Lawyer and 

Planter, late President of the State Senate, vol. i. . . 387 
BENJAMIN r. PERRY, of Greenville, Lawyer, Editor and 
Planter, vol, ii, ....... . 581 

TENNESSEE- 
SAMUEL ANDERSON, of Murfreesboro', Lawyer , Judge 
of the Circuit Court for the Fifth Circuit, vol. ii. . . 419 

AARON V. BROWN, of Nashville, Lawyer, late Governor 
of Tennessee, and Member of Congress, vol. i, , . 89 

JOHN CATRON, of Nashville, Lawyer, Justice of the Su- 
preme Court of the United States, vol, ii, , , . 805 

FRANCIS BRINLEY FOGG, of Nashville, Lawyer, Mem- 
ber of the State Constitutional Convention of Tennessee in 
1834, vol. ii. . • 667 

CHARLES F. KEITH, of Athens, Lawyer and Planter, 
Judge of the Circuit Court for the Third Circuit, vol. ii. . 763 

WEST H. HUMPHREYS, of Nashville, Lawyer, Reporter 

and Attorney -General for the state, vol, ii 826 9 

ANDREW J. MARCHBANKS, of McMinnville, Lawyer, • 
Judge of the Circuit Court for the 13th Circuit, vol, ii. . 563 

ARCHIBALD W, OVERTON, of Carthage, Lawyer and 
Planter, formerly on the Bench, vol, ii 565 

GIDEON J. PILLOW, of Columbia, Lawyer and Planter, 
Major-General in the late Mexican War, vol, ii, , 691 

JOHN POPE, of Memphis, Planter, President of the Union 
Bank, vol. ii. - . 623 

VERMONT- 
SAMUEL PRENTISS, of Montpelier, Lawyer, Judge of the 
United States District Court for Vermont, vol. ii. . . 717 

VIRGINIA- 
JOHN C, CAMPBELL, of Wheeling, Physician, President 

of the Northwestern Bank of Virginia, vol. i, . . . 161 
JOHN W. NASH, of Powhatan, Lawyer, Judge of the 

Second Circuit Court, vol. ii, ..... . 577 

DANIEL A, WILSON, of Lynchburg, Lawyer, formerly one 

of the Judges of the General Court of Virginia, vol, ii. , 429 




^^^■^37 Z S Si--' 



rilOITo JAMIE S 1: o OB.M, 



3r.L . CF .'jOUTS CARCLi:-U 



'%n3^ fjr Elcjra.v'hjL^^l S<etxhe^ sf ^mLr^rJ: /irruiru^uLS . 



EIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES 



OF 



EMINENT AMERICANS. 

WITH PORTRAITS. 

HON. JAMES L. ORR 

OF SOUTH CAROLINA. 

The subject of this sketch was born at Craytonville, in Anderson 
district, South Carolina, on the 12th day of May, 1822. His father 
was Christopher Orr, and his mother Martha McCann. His paternal 
grandfather was John Orr, a native of Wake county, North Carolina, 
and a soldier in the Revolutionary war. His maternal grandfather 
was Robert McCann, a native of the County Down, Ireland, who emi- 
grated to the United States about 178G. His father commenced life 
without pecuniary means, but by a successful prosecution of mercantile 
pursuits acquired the means of educating thoroughly a family of three 
sons and two daughters. At an early age he was placed at a country 
school, and after acquiring the rudiments of an English education he 
was placed at an academy at Anderson and commenced the study of 
the languages (Latin and Greek) under the Rev. J. L, Kennedy, a 
teacher of considerable reputation in the upper districts of Carolina. 
His academical education was completed under Mr. Wesley Leverett, 
a classical scholar of fine attainments, and a teacher who has educated 
more young men who are useful in society than any man of his age in 
the region of country where he has taught. Whilst prosecuting his 
academical course his education in business and human nature was not 
neglected. On public days, in the village where his father resided, he 
was transferred from the school-room to the merchant's counter and 
counting-room, and made a most efficient salesman and book-keeper. 

The knowledge he thus obtained of practical business and of men 
has perhaps been one of the most active influences in moulding his 
subsequent career, which has thus far been more successful than most 
men of his age. 

In the eighteenth year of his age he matriculated a student at the 
University of Virginia, preferring that institution for the reason that he 
could devote himself to such studies alone as would be peculiarly 

25* 



394 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

serviceable to him in prosecuting the profession of the law, which he 
had at this early period determined to embrace. 

His first year was spent profitably in pursuing the following studies : 
Natural, mental, and moral philosophy ; political economy ; logic, 
rhetoric, belles-lettres, medical jurisprudence, geology, and miner- 
alogy, as also international, constitutional, and the elements of com- 
mon law. 

He was graduated the first year in moral philosophy, including meta- 
physics, political economy, and medical jurisprudence. The second 
year he devoted his entire time to the law, under the direction of the 
late J. A. G. Davis, professor in the university, but before its termi- 
nation Professsor Davis was most unfortunately killed by one of the 
students, and the board of visitors, in the emergency presented, feeling 
the necessity of supplying Professor Davis' place at once, as the law 
class numbered some sixty or seventy students, gave the temporary 
appointment for the remainder of -the term to a young lawyer of Rich- 
mond, but as he had little experience in his profession the subject of 
our memoir determined to return to his home, where he supposed he 
could prosecute his studies with more profit in some office in his own 
state. The course of study prescribed at the university was very 
comprehensive, and he who waded through it, understandingly, could 
hardly fail in making himself a good elementary lawyer. Mr. Orr 
studied here the commentaries of Lord Coke upon Littleton, and ad- 
vanced as far in exploring this fountain of English jurisprudence as the 
youthful mind could go; and he has often declared that his knowledge 
of the principles of the English common law, and more especially those 
governing real estate, was derived from this quaint but profound jurist. 

It is much to be regretted that so few of the lawyers of the present 
day have any familiarity with the commentaries of Coke, for it is really 
the foundation-stone of the common law, and none can understand the 
law of real estate satisfactorily without its comprehension. He who 
bravely encounters its quaintness and intricacies, and reaches his beauti- 
ful benediction to the student, where he says, " And now farewell to our 
jurisprudent ! We wish unto him the gladsome light of jurisprudence, 
the loveliness of temperance, the stability of fortune, and the solidity of 
justice," has indeed achieved an intellectual and professional triumph, 
and has panoplied himself in such solid legal learning as never to cause 
the heart to quail in encountering a professional rival. The year 1841, 
being the first after his return from college, was spent in society, and 
in reading history, ancient and modem, Hume's and Lingard's, with 
the same care as law-books ; and the former is as indispensable to the 
course of a lawyer's reading as Blackstone or Kent. In January, 1842, 
he entered the office of J. N. Whitner, Esq., then the solicitor of the 
western circuit, who has since been promoted to a judgeship, and 
commenced reading the course of study prescribed by the law court of 
appeals of South Carolina, preparatory to applying for admission to the 
bar. The course is very comprehensive, and applicants for admission 
are subjected to a strict examination thereon, in presence of the whole 
court, before granting a license ; if found prepared, upon the exami- 
nation, are admitted ; if not, are rejected. Judge Whitner was, in per 
forming the duties of his office, necessarily absent from home at least 



JAMES L. ORR, OF SODTH CAROLINA. 395 

six months in the year, and whilst Mr. Orr was his student very much 
of the office business and practice was devolved upon him. He not 
only issued cases and prepared the pleadings, but oiten, ex necessitate, 
gave counsel to Judge Whitner's clients, and he derived two very im- 
portant advantages therefrom — first, it familiarized him with the practice 
in the courts of law and equity, and furnished the occasion of a}>plying 
the elementary principles of his reading to actual cases ; and secondly, 
it gave him confidence in his judgment, and capability to determine a 
legal proposition. He completed the course, and was admitted to the 
bar in May, 1843, at the age of twenty-one. He opened an office at 
Anderson, South Carolina, where he was reared and educated, and 
within a few miles of his native place. He was more fortunate than 
most young lawyers, for within eighteen months after he was licensed 
he was surrounded with quite a respectable practice. 

In the fall of 1843, having a taste for politics from boyhood, he 
established a newspaper in the town in which he resided, entitled the 
Anderson Gazette, and took the chair editorial, which he filled for one 
year. 

In November, 1843, he married Miss Mary Jane Marshall, second 
daughter of Dr. Samuel Marshall, of Abbeville district. In the follow- 
ing spring he became a candidate for the legislature, and after an ani- 
mated contest he was elected at the head of the ticket, and by an over- 
whelming majority over his whig opponents. He canvassed the district 
very closely, and every voter had the opportunity of hearing him on the 
stump. His party friends were highly gratified at the ability he ex- 
hibited in the canvass, and appreciated in no stinted measure the signal 
services he rendered in the democratic cause and in favor of Mr. Polk's 
election to the presidency. 

In this connection it is proper to relate the fact, that Mr. Orr from boy- 
hood intermingled freely amongst the people, and before he was twenty he 
was personally acquainted with most of the citizens of his district. His 
bland manners, his address and his conversations made him a lavorite 
in all ranks. This favorable knowledge of him, as a boy and youth, se- 
cured him friends and practice at the bar, and when he was a little 
more than twenty-two years old he was elected to the legislature, re- 
ceiving about 2500 votes. The same district in 1840 gave a majority 
for the whig candidate for the presidency. He entered the legislature, 
having received a higher vote than any man in the state, but being a 
new member he participated only occasionally in debate. In the dis- 
cussions in which he participated he acquitted himself to the entire satis- 
faction of his friends and constituents, and at the next election he was 
re-elected. He entered actively into the debates of these two sessions. 
There have never been reporters of the proceedings of the South Caro- 
lina legislature, and we have consequently none of his speeches pre- 
served. His principal speeches were made on reforming the free school 
system, giving the election of presidental electors to the people, (now 
selected by the legislature on joint ballot,) in advocacy of extending 
the aid of the state in constructing the Greenville and Columbia, the 
Charlotte and South Carolina, and the Wilmington and Manchester 
rail-roads, and on various questions connected with the federal relations 
of the state. In 1845 he formed a copartnership in the law with J. P. 



396 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

Reed. Esq., now the solicitor of the western circuit, which continued 
until the spring of 1848, when he became a candidate for Congress. 
The records of the court shew that nearly one-half of all the business 
of the courts of law and equity was transacted by this firm ; and they 
had quite a good practice at some others of the courts of the circuit. 
Mr. Orr has studied human character to great profit in the management 
of his causes in court. His perception of the strong features of his 
case is clear and quick, and he consequently does not make long 
speeches to the jury. His most elaborate argument in a will case, in 
which he took a deep interest, was concluded in a little more than one 
hour. Plis speeches are argumentative, put principally in the style of 
interrogation, without any effort at oratorical display. 

The court of chancery has always been his favorite branch of juris- 
prudence. The success with which he has practised in that court is an 
enduring memorial of the excellence of his tact and judgment in fram- 
ing bills and answers. The first bill he ever drew was in a case involved 
in the greatest intricacy, and the presiding chancellor said of it that it 
was the most skilfully drawn bill he had seen out of the city practice 
in Charleston. 

In 1848, as we have already stated, he became a candidate for Con- 
gress. His opponent was a lawyer of talents and great professional 
reputation, with much experience in political aflfairs, having served some 
fifteen years in both branches of the state legislature. They were both 
democrats, and the contest was therefore purely personal. The canvass 
was an exciting one, both the aspirants devoting nearly their whole 
time to it for six months preceding the election, which took place in 
October of that year. When the votes were counted it was ascertained 
that Mr. Orr had beaten his opponent about seven hundred votes. Un- 
der all the circumstances it was a most signal manifestation of the con- 
fidence and esteem by the people for one so youthful. He took his 
seat in December, 1849, a member of the 31st Congress, a Congress 
which has been distinguished for more startling incidents than any other 
in the history of this government. He was opposed to the settlement 
of the sectional question on the basis of what was denominated the 
compromise. He believed that the settlement did injustice to his sec- 
tion of the country; that one or the other side was cheated in the or- 
ganization of the territorial governments of Utah and New-Mexico, the 
north asserting that Mexican law excluded slavery, and the south the 
opposite opinion ; that Congress had no constitutional power to buy a 
part of a sovereign state and place the population thereon under a ter- 
ritorial government; that if the land belonged to Texas, the govern- 
ment had not the right to buy ; if it belonged to the United States then, 
it was wholly indefensible to take $10,000,000 from the public treasury 
to pay for that which was already their property ; and lastly, that Cali- 
fornia was admitted with excessive territory, without an enumeration 
of her citizens, having formed her constitution without the authority of 
Congress and against all the precedents existing in the previous history 
of the government. The principal speech he made at this session was 
on the slavery agitation, in which he discussed very elaborately the 
tendency and ultimate end of agitation if it was not arrested, and also 
presenting views why California should not be admitted into the Union 



JAMES L. ORR, OF SOUTH CAROLINA. 397 

before she had passed a territorial pupilage. He therefore voted against 
all the measures of compromise except the fugitive slave law. He 
participated occasionally in the general debates of the house at this 
session as also at the next. 

When he returned home in March, 1851, at the close of the short ses- 
sion, the State of South Carolina had called a constitutional convention, 
and delegates thereto had been elected, a large majority of whom were 
pledged to vote for the secession of that state from the Union, on ac- 
count of the injustice of the compromise. Mr. Orr advised originally 
against the call of the convention, as, we believe, did a majority of the 
South Carolina delegation in Congress, as he was unwilling that South 
Carolina should incur all the hazards attendant upon secession without 
she had the co-operation of other sister southern states. The constitu- 
tion of South Carolina provides for calling a convention when two- 
thirds of both branches of the legislature concur therein ; and when the 
convention was called the separate state actionists had not quite two- 
thirds, the other third being iu favor of providing simply for the election 
of delegates to a southern congress, as recommended by the Nashville 
Convention, and opposed to isolating South Carolina from the South. 
Neither party could carry their measure, and the two were blended into 
one bill, entitled, an act ''to provide for the appointment of deputies to 
a southern congress, and to call a convention of the people of the state," 
and passed, the minority having been induced to vote for the call of the 
convention to have the state ready to co-operate with any other state or 
states, or, in the event of a failure, to act then, that a convention might 
be ready to ratify or reject what might be done in the southern congress, 
if it assembled. The elections were ordered in February, as already 
stated, and resulted in the choice of a large majority who were favor- 
able to separate action, and the pretence was then set up by the seces- 
sion organs that this was the original purpose for which the convention 
was called. Colonel Orr's congressional district had elected about two 
delegates in favor of secession to one against it, and such was the state 
of parties when he returned home. He, however, notwithstanding his 
belief that he was in a minority of one-third, openly proclaimed his op- 
position to the policy of those who claimed to be a majority ; and in a 
public speech at Pickens, a few weeks after his return home, he warned 
his countrymen against the disasters which would inevitably follow if 
the policy of separate secession was carried out — not denying, however, 
the right of a state to secede from the Union if she chose to do it ; for 
he has always expressed the opinion that there was but one effectual 
shield against a central despotism by the general government, and that 
was in upholding and maintaining the rights of the several states who 
are parties to the federal compact. The right of peaceable secession he 
holds to be the highest attribute of sovereignty, and its denial leads ir- 
retrievably to consolidation. Early in May he attended as a delegate 
the convention of the southern rights' associations, held in Charleston- 
It was a body of great intelligence, and numbering some 450 delegates; 
but, representing the southern rights' associations, it was made up of 
the most ultra men in the state, and the moderates did not exceed thirty. 
Among that number, however, was the Hon. R. W. Barnwell, late 
United States senator from South Carolina, Judge Butler, the present 



398 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

senator, and Colonel Orr, each of whom addressed the convention in 
opposition to the policy of the majority. Colonel Orr introduced the 
resolution upon which the minority founded their report, and which af- 
terwards formed the basis of the co-operation party ; for the one was 
known as the secession, and the other as the co-operation party. Col. 
Orr's speech was the most effective he ever made on any theatre, and 
so hiffhly was it appreciated that it was published by the executive 
committee of the party in Charleston, and circulated in every district 
and parish in the commonwealth. 

The election of delegates to a southern Congress was ordered for 
October, and as no other popular election was to occur, except that, 
until the probable meeting and action of the convention, the co-opera- 
tion party determined to test the strength of parties in that election. 
Two deputies were to be chosen in each congressional district, and the 
party, by common consent, determined to bring forward Colonel Orr 
and Colonel Irby, of Laurens, as their candidates. The secessionists, 
after declining to run opposition to those gentlemen, subsequently 
brought furward two gentlemen, who enjoyed more personal popularity 
than any other two persons in the congressional district. The Hon. R. F. 
Simpson, a member of Congress for several years, a gentleman of high 
character and great moral worth, and the Hon. H. C. Young, long a 
member of both branches of the legislature, a distinguished lawyer, a 
man of talents, and enjoying a sweeping practice at the bar. Colonel 
Orr commenced the canvass early in August, and was either on the 
stump or on the road almost every day, until the second Monday in 
October. After finishing the tour of his own district, he went into the 
adjoining districts, on special invitations from his political friends. He 
encountered the eloquence and personal popularity of his Excellency 
Gov. Means, who was reviewing the militia in that section of the state 
— who, when the drill was ended, would address the people, and urge 
them that secession was not only practicable, but that it was their only 
remedy against the wrongs of the federal government. The governor 
and Colonel Orr each addressed six of the eight regiments of militia in 
the 2d district ; Colonel Orr subsequently addressed the remaining two. 
Upon counting the votes, it appeared that Colonel Orr had received 
5,010. and his highest opponent 1.80G. giving the former a majority in 
his district, of 3.204 votes. When the canvass opened, five of the 
six newspapers in his district assailed his position and brought all their 
influence to bear against him. When the canvass ended, he expressed 
the opinion that there had not been such a change of public opinion as 
was supposed, that the opposition to secession had merely developed 
itself, and that the secessionists had deceived themselves in assuming 
that the majority was overwhelming in their favor in the outset. Du- 
ring the same month, the Circuit Courts commenced, and his labors 
turned to a new field ; in most of the important cases at Anderson and 
Pickens he was retained. He added, during this circuit, much to his 
reputation as a jurist and advocate. His duties at Washington prevent 
him from attending, every other year, the spring courts of his cir- 
cuit and the courts of chancery, and, all the time, the appeal court. 
This has and will militate much against his practice — whenever a lawyer 
consents to embark in politics, he may make up his mind, in a great 



JAMES L, ORR, OF SOUTH CAROLINA. 399 

measure, to give up his profession. In the great press of political and 
legal pursuits, Colonel Orr has found time to prepare several orations 
on various topics. He delivered, in 1845, the anniversary oration be- 
fore the literary societies of Erskine College, and, in 1851, before the 
literary societies of Mercer University, Georgia. His style of speaking 
is earnest and impressive. His voice is strong and clear, and his enun- 
ciation distinct. He is never tedious, but secures attention by the 
sound and sensible views which he takes of the subjects which he dis- 
cusses. The character of his intellectual efforts discloses the fact that 
he is capable of close and continued application, and possesses, in a high 
degree, the power of discrimination and analysis — much of his success 
is referable to confidence in his ability to achieve what he undertakes, 
and a temper naturally sanguine, sustained by an unusually healthy phy- 
sical organization. Naturally cheerful, he loses none of his energies 
in despondency, and will always make the most of the knowledge he 
may acquire. He is a striking illustration of the frankness of the 
southern gentleman in his manner — with fine colloquial powers and a 
decidedly social turn, he is a most agreeable companion, always contri- 
buting his share to social pleasures. He writes with facility and cor- 
rectness, and has acquired a style well adapted to his pursuits. There is 
little artificial either in the manner of his speaking or writing, and much 
of the force of both is derived from this circumstance. Indeed, the frank 
and honest earnestness with which he impresses his views give great force 
and effect to his efforts as a speaker or writer, and a fund of sound infor- 
mation, always at his command, must necessarily secure to him decided 
influence. Col. Orr is stout and athletic, exhibiting the vigor of matured 
manhood combined with a striking personal appearance ; his phrenological 
developments indicate quickness and decision combined with consider- 
able powers of analysis. Kind and courteous, his intercourse with his 
fellow-men will always increase the number of his friends, and, should 
he continue in public life, he is destined to render valuable services to 
his country. He represents the district in which the distinguished and 
lamented Calhoun resided, and, in common with all who knew him, 
venerates the memory of that illustrious statesman. Like most of the 
politicians of his state, he cherishes an enthusiastic attachment to South 
Carolina and her interests, which has, at all times, so secured to such 
public servants the confidence of their constituents, as that the term of 
office, as a representative, although nominally but two years, is conti- 
nued by renewal as long as they desire to serve. To this continuance 
of the same individuals in Congress for a number of years is to be at- 
tributed the great influence of that state in the public counsels — a poli- 
cy founded in wisdom and justified by experience. 



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BENJAMIN F. HUNT, OF SOUTH CAROLINA. 401 

BENJAMIN FANEUIL HUNT, 

OF CHARLESTON, SOUTH CAROLINA. 

[We have been furnished with the followincr memoir from the pen of a literary 
friend and colemporary of Col. Hunt, in Charleston. — Editor.] 

The subject of this memoir was born on the 29th day of February, 
1792, at Watertown, near Boston, Massachusetts. His father was the 
descendant of a clergyman, who emigrated with the early settlers of the 
state. Having completed his education at Harvard University, on the 
morning of the day of Bunker's Hill, his father accompanied General 
Warren, at that time his guest, to the battle-ground, where his conduct 
merited such approval as to induce General Washington, on his arrival 
in Massachusetts, to appoint him quarter-master in the American army. 
His original books remain in the possession of his son, and contain 
many curious details of that interesting period. After the war he com- 
menced his career as a lawyer, and became extensively engaged in busi- 
ness, which continued until his death in 1804. 

Maternally, the subject of this memoir is equally well related. His 
mother was a daughter of George Bethune of Brighton, and Mary Fa- 
neuil, a descendant of the Huguenots, who left France at the revocation 
of the Edict of Nantes.* 

At the death of his father, in 1804, Mr. Hunt was left to complete his 
education and prepare himself for business. Apt to learn, he became 
ambitious of receiving a liberal education, and, such was his determined 



* The name of Fancuil is thus derived, as appears hy a communication in the 
Boston Evening Transcript : " In 1685, at the period of the revocation of the 
Edict of Nantz, there were living in or near Kochellc, in France, three brothers and 
two sisters of the Faneuil family. When the persecution commenced, so ably and 
touchingly described by James Saurin, two fled for safety to foreign lands. An- 
drew, the elder brother, escaped into Holland, and took up his abode in Amsterdam, 
where he married that pre-eminently beautiful lady whose portrait is now in the 
possession of Col. Benjamin Faneuil Hunt, whose mother was Jane Bethune, a 
daughter of Mary Faneuil. Andrew, before many years, came to this country as 
early as 1709. In Holland he acquired his passion for flowers, which he gratified 
in his seven-acre Eden. He acquired a large estate, which he distributed among 
the public funds in France, England and Holland. He died February 13lh, 1737. 
Benjamin Faneuil, his brother, was clo.sely associated with that little band of Hu- 
guenots, who clustered arouipd about the town of Karragansett, at the very close 
of the 17th century. In 1699, lie ni.irried a French lady. Anne Bureau The 
transcript is thus, in French (translation): 'The 28th July, 1699, Benjamin Fa- 
neuil and Anne Bureau were married at rsarrajjansett, in New-England, at the house 
of Mr. Peter Ayross, by Mr. Peter Daille, minister of the French church in Boston. 
Benjamin Faneuil, the propositus or stirps, became the father of eleven children by 
his wife, Anne Bureau, all born in New-Kochelle. in the State of New-York. Peter, 
who was the donor of Faneuil Hall, was born 20th June, 1700.' Benjamin, his 
brother, and maternal grandfather of Col. Hunt, was born December, 1701. He 
was a merchant and frequented England and France. Peter died in 1742-43, 
and left a large possession, which fell to his brother Benjamin, who survived until 
October, 1785, when he also died. He resided at Brighton, near Boston, and was 
two months less than eighty-four years old when he died. He had for many years 

26 



402 SKF.TCHES OF EMINENT AMEIUCANS. 

purpose and confidence of future success, ihat his mother was induced to 
furnish the necessary means to defray the expenses of his academical 
and collegiate education. Accordingly, in 1800, he entered Harvard 
University, and four years afterwards, in his twentieth year, graduated. 
His health being delicate, and his family physician advising that a 
warmer climate could alone save him from consumption, a disease 
which had carried off all his brothers, he removed to Charleston, South 
Carolina, which has ever since been the place of his abode. On the first 
day of November, 1810, Mr. Hunt reached this city. He brought 
with him a good education, a few letters of introduction, a mother's 
blessing and a determination to succeed. His reception was marked by 
the proverbial hospitality and idndness of the place; but intending to 
become a citizen, he at once determined to put aside the claim of guest 
and take his place on an equality with others in the competition of use- 
fulness and honor. The late Keating Lewis Simons was, at that time, 
a distinguished lawyer at the Charleston bar. Mr. Hunt entered his 
office for instruction, and, during the time of his studies, no student per- 
haps ever worked more faithfully. With classical studies he was fami- 
liar, from the excellent training of his particular tutor, the late Profes- 
sor Frisbey. After two years' study, Mr. Hunt applied for admission 
to practice law, and was duly admitted to the bar. To a less resolute 
and hopeful mind, the opening prospect would have proved anything 
but inviting. Eminent men crowded the Charleston bar ; and, for most 
■of them, family wealth and parentage had done quite as much as in- 
trinsic merit. JNIr. Hunt saw this, and his friends were so discouraged 
at his prospect, that they even advised him to abandon the vain hope of 
breaking through such an array of established practitioners and leave 
the metropolis for some less thronged theatre. 

prior to his death, adopted his grand-daughter, Jane Bcthunc, the mother of Col. 
Hunt, who became his reader and amanuensis, and thus acquired an early know- 
ledge of the realities of life, and acquired those clear and strong views of its obliga- 
tions and duties that so i)eculiarly marked her character and rendered her one of the 
best examples of ' an old-time lady' On the birth of her son, she gave him the name 
of her venerated grandfather " The following description of this j)atriarch is taken 
from a description attributed to a distinguished writer of the article, " Dealings 
with the Dsal." Speaking of Bonjamin Faneuil, hcsays : "This veteran had 
been a generous liver all his days. He was not a man whose devotion was ab- 
dominal, whose God was his belly. He was no anchorite in this species of devo- 
tion, but as an advocate for social worship, he was pre-eminently hospitable. For 
.more than forty years from the period when Peter's death afforded him the means, 
his hospitality had been a proverb, a by-word, but never a reproach. There was a 
refinement about it. It was precisely such hospitality as Apicius would have prac- 
ticed had Apicius been a bishop. His appetite never forsook him. He died sud- 
tlenlv ; ate a cheerful dinner on the day of his death, and went not to his account 
on an empty stomach, a nephritic malady occasioned his decease." 

His grand-daughter also attained the venerable age of eighty-three, and lived to 
see her son and her son"s sons gathered around her, and retained her early acquired 
habit of reading until a few months of her death, in 1840. She was a lady of un- 
usual firmness and good sense, and of great decision of character. She continued 
even in the evening of her days an example of the dignified manners of the age in 
which she was educated, and her mansion was the cherished resort of her relatives 
and friends, young and old, and she carried to her tomb the love and veneration of 
her posterity and the profound respect of the ci>mmunity which she adorned by 
her excellent judgment and uniform kindness and benevolence. — E». 



BENJAMIN F. HUNT, OF SOUTH CAROLINA. 403 

He differed with iheiu huwever, and argued that the ability of his 
antagonists would rather tend to sharpen than discourage his faculties 
and stimulate his exertions; that the people were his family, and he 
could always find relations enough among them to supply the necessary 
amount of professional business. Nor was he mistaken. Just at this 
time, a new order of things was taking place in South Carolina. The 
agricultural interest, though not less extensive than before, was not the 
only'one of importance. Family influences, if not passing away, were 
then becoming less material, and Mr. Hunt felt that he had that within him 
which, in the legal conflicts likely to arise, would enable him to become 
a bold and efficient advocate. Such a reliance implied great mental 
courage on his part. It will be seen that he neither misjudged himself 
nor mistook events. Soon after his admission, Mr. Hunt found oppor- 
tunities of coming into collision with some of the most distinguished 
members of the bar, and instead of lingering for years on the outskirts 
of the profession, he was almost at once entrusted with the management 
of important cases. It is a truth, now, as then, that lawyers and doc- 
tors are employed not so much from favor, as a security to the lives 
and estates of those who employ them, and when either of these is at 
stake, those interested are not slow in discovering where the most avail- 
able assistance is to be found. Mr. Hunt was already pointed to as 
one of those young men who had determined 

•■ To scorn delight anil live laborious days," 

and his fellow-citizens did not miscalculate in supposing that their busi- 
ness would be properly managed when entrusted to his care. Unusual 
success attended his eflibrts, and, while the profession were literally 
bewildered to learn why such favorable issues attended most of his 
cases, the public, not regarding the reason, but only looking at the re- 
sult, steadily increased its patronage. Envy and malice are the sha- 
dows which usually follow^ success, and the former redouble as the 
latter increases. Such was Mr. Hunt's case. The young man, whom 
it was safe to smile upon, while struggling up the professional ladder, 
was now reaching too crazy a height, and professional brethren were 
not wanting who were willing to bring him back to reason by stopping 
his too rapid ascent. " Kill or cure," was the practice suggested for the 
patient ; nor were those wanting who were ready to administer the pre- 
scription. As Mr. Hunt had been brought up in a society where " pri- 
vate war" was seldom resorted to, his forbearing temper was, perhaps, 
too much relied upon. It became necessary to disabuse his opponents 
on this point at once. Accordingly, he made up an issue with them, 
invited them to the field, and proving the better marksman, his weapons 
have been permitted to rust ever since, and he has prided himself upon 
healing the controversies of his fiiends by an open, candid admission 
when wrong, united with a firm i-esolve to suffer no injustice himself nor 
permit others who confided in him to do so. 

Mr. Hunt now found that he had taken a vantage ground, to maintain 
which demanded ceaseless vigilance and industry. If dangers, liowever, 
surrounded him — if sometimes he doubted whether friends would stand 
true to him, he did not quail, but, falling back upon himself, he sus- 



404 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

tained himself in the rule of the wise man — " Take counsel of thine own 
heart, for none can be more faithful unto thee." 

In 1818, Col. Hunt's popularity* had increased so much that he was 
elected to represent Charleston District in the state legislature. In this 
capacity he h is, at intervals, served his fellow-citizens to the present 
time. Nor have his services been without eminent advantages to the 
jurisprudence of the state. The act of 1822, requiring the legislature to 
sanction every act of emancipation, has wisely brought the whole mat- 
ter under the control of the whole state, and put an end to the death- 
bed follies which servants were able to induce by working upon the im- 
becilities of owners. The wisdom of this act has been abundantly mani- 
fested in the increased peace and order of the slave in his relations with 
those around him. 

Mr. Hunt was also successful in procuring the abolition of the old 
common law rule, confining del)tors, admitted to jail bounds, to within 
a hundred yards around the jail walls — a cruelty perfectly gratuitous, 
as it moved the unlucky debtor from his home, and compelled him to 
remain in idleness and want, and without the power of exertion. Ho 
finally succeeded in having the limits extended to the boundaries of the 
judicial district — an amelioration which has greatly diminished the suf- 
fering of the unfortunate without impairing the rights of any one. But 
to proceed with Mr. Hunt's professional career. To the well-read lawyer, 
Mr. Hunt's numerous legal triumphs are familiar. A brief review of 
some of ihem, however, may not prove unininteresting. 

The State v. Antonio, for coining, was among the first cases that 
established his reputation at the bar. From design or blunder, the re- 
porter has placed another name instead of Mr. Hunt's as the counsel 
engaged in the management of the suit. The case was tried in the Ap- 
peal Court as early as 1810, while as yet Mr. Hunt had only been three 
years at the bar. At that day, instead of a simple " concurrence," each 
judge was required to deliver his own separate reasons for his decision. 
Antonio was indicted for coining a silver dollar, the current coin of the 
United States. Coining, under the state law of 1785, anterior to the 
constitution of the United States, was punishable with death, but the 
act of Congress punished the offence with only imprisonment. To save 
the life of the prisoner, it became important to remove the case from 
the state to the United States Court. Mr. Hunt made the attempt, 
which was considered almost ridiculous by a majority of the bench and 
bar. His argument, however, arrested the attention of that acute and 
able ornatnent of the Carolina bench, Judge Nott, who, against the opi- 
nion of all the other judges, sustained Mr. Hunt's position, not only as 



* On the declaration of war in 1812, Mr. Hunt aided in organizing a company, 
which was drafted, during the war, into the service of tlie United States, and 
throughout its continuance faithfully fulfilled the responsible duties of his com- 
mand. He successively rose through the intermediate grades, and about the year 
1818, was" promoted to the colonelcy of the sixteenth regiment, and served in that 
capacity nearly twenty years. Since then, Mr. Hunt has been popularly and fami 
liarly known as " Colonel Hunt." In his military position he has always manifested 
the characteristic traits of energy, fearlessness, and ability, both as a soldier and a 
tactician, that have so singularly distinguished him as a lawyer and a legislator. 



BENJAMIN F. HUNT, OF SCUTH CAROLINA. 405 

to the jurisdiction of the court, but for a new trial. This opinion being 
overruled by ;i majority of the court, Antonio was sentenced to be 
hanged. But Mr. Hunt was bent upon saving the prisoner, and he was 
not to be baffled in his purpose. Casting about for a remedy, he fear- 
lessly entered a prosecution against his client in the United States Court, 
charging him as guilty of counterfeiting the current coin of the United 
States, and caused application to be made to Judge Johnson, of the 
Federal Court, for Antonio's arrest. The application was granted, and 
a collision arose between the marshal of the United States and the 
sherilF of South Carolina as to who should hold the prisoner; the former 
to have him tried, and the latter to have him hanged. The case was a 
novel one, and, from the daring position taken by so young a practitioner, 
and from the ability with which he fortified it, great excitement was 
created. In this dilemma the pardoning power of the governor was ap- 
pealed to, when he, appreciating the correctness of Mr. Hunt's position, 
granted a free pardon to the condemned, and the necessity of executing 
the Habeas corpus ad subjiciendum was prevented. 

In Nott and McCord's Reports for the year 1819, page 546, is the 
case of the State v. Hey ward, for perjury. Mr. Hunt's argument shows 
how scientifically he had studied his profession. So strong and well 
sustained was his position, that Judge Cheves reversed his own decision 
on circuit, and arrested the judgment. 

In the same Reports, page 132, is another important case, displaying 
Mr. Hunt's legal ability. The question involved the liability of the 
owner of goods received at an intermediate place for pro rata tVeight. 
Mr. Hunt obtained a verdict for his client against Lorent and Steinmetz. 
From this, Mr. Simons, his former preceptor, appealed, and. although 
opposed by such formidable talent, Mi". Hunt sustained his verdict. 

In the case of Gough v. Walker, (Nott and McCord's Reports, page 
469,) involving the question, " whether a renunciation of dower must 
be recorded to render it valid," Mr. Hunt did not only succeed in re- 
versing the circuit decree, but evoked from Judge Cheves, in his dis- 
senting opinion, a high encomium on the argument of counsel. 

The Reports of Nott and McCord for the years 1819 and 1820, con- 
tain a large number of cases involving a variety of complex questions, 
in most of which Mr. Hunt had a part, and always appeared to advan- 
tage. 

Although Mr. Hunt has been so frequently -censured for making con- 
stitutional questions, he has nevertheless seldom failed in them. In 
Harper's Reports, are several cases famous in their day. In Dunn v. 
City Council of Charleston, page 189, he procured a prohibition 
against the city, because the state law was unconstitutional, taking the 
whole lot of an individual to widen a street, when part only was 
necessary, and the city attempting a speculation on the residue. 
This was in 1824. It met the high encomium of that eminent jurist, 
Justice Nott, (see page 195,) the whole of whose decision is the most 
perfect specimen of constitutional argument in our books, and worthy 
of the careful study of every lawyer. 

The case of Singleton v. Bremar (Harper 201) is one in which Mr. 
Hunt was matched against the reporter, the late Chancellor Harper, one 
of the ablest men at the Carolina bar. 



406 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

The case of Marshall vs. White (page 122) involved a question 
novel in South Carolina, as to whether the right to a pew in a church 
was real estate which was decided in his favor. 

The case of John Stoney vs. The Union Insurance Company (Harper's 
R., p. 235) is somewhat characteristic. Mr. Hunt had obtained a ver- 
dict, and the court ordered a new trial; when a verdict was a second 
time rendered against the charge of the judge. At the ne.\t trial, the 
Judge (Huger) instructed the jury, that the case had been decided by 
the Appeal Court. Mr. Hunt told the jury "that unless the judge 
granted a nonsuit he had no right to dictate a verdict, which twelve men 
were to swear was a true verdict." The jury a third time found for his 
client. Upon this another appeal was made, and the Appeal Court 
again ordered a new trial, Mr. Hunt still insisting that the court was 
wrong, and so said the jury. When the case came up once more, 
it was argued in May, and Mr. Hunt requested the court to take the 
interval to the winter sitting, to read his authorities. In January, 
Judge Nott, who was appointed to write the decision before the court 
opened, called Mr. Hunt and handed him what was intended to be, the 
opinion of the court, now sustaining the verdict, but strange to say, the 
judges, who had not studied the case, refused to concur. A new trial 
was therefore ordered, and a new verdict obtained. This time the ap- 
peal court was changed, and consisted of three justices : Judge Nott 
presiding, and Colcock and Johnson associates. Judge Johnson, how- 
ever, being sick. Judge Huger supplied his place, and two being a 
majority, Judges Nott and Huger, who had both been convinced, 
refused a new trial, and Mr. Hunt recovered the amount from the insu- 
rance company. 

It is curious, that Mr. Hunt has seldom had any associate. Most of 
his cases have been argued by himself, and generally from his original 
notes. The case of the Medical College (2 Hill's Reports, 368) 
is one illustrating the tenacity with which he adhered in the appeal court 
to his first view of his client's case. His arguments are not crowded 
with a parade of obsolete legal learning. He ascertains what legal posi- 
tions the facts of the case give rise to, and these he maintains by a close 
application of the principles of the law sustained by the decided cases. 

His practice in the court of equity kept pace with that at law. 
Among his first cases was a bill filed by McBurney against Dillon. 
Dillon was a surveyor, and was employed by one Thompson to survey 
the present site of Walterborough, and pass it to a grant under the 
location laws of South Carolina. Dillon made the survey but took out 
the grant to himself, and the bill was filed to set aside the grant 
as fraudulent and void, and raised the novel question, " whether the 
judicial power extended to setting aside a grant iinder the great seal?" 
In England, it was conceded that it would not, but Mr. Hunt insisted 
that no such deference was due to wax and parchment, and there was no 
majesty so high as to sanction fraud. Opposed in this view by some 
of the oldest and most learned solicitors, he successfully maintained his 
position. The grant was declared void, and ^McBurney got his title to 
the village as heir of Thompson. 

A notice of a few of his cases before the court of equity, will serve 
to show his mode of reasoning. The case of the Vestry and Wardens 



BENJAMIN F. HUNT, OF SOUTH CAROLINA. 407 

of Qirist Church vs. Thomas Barksdale (Strobart's Equity li.) exem- 
plifies his way of stating his propositions. A majority of the vestry of 
one of the oldest established Episcopal Churches in South Carolina, 
removed in the summer to a sea-shore residence. Tlierc, they erected 
a summer church, and invoked the patronage of the old church, protest- 
ing they would not interfere with its funds. But by dint of getting a 
majority in the vestry, they applied a long-established charity to pur- 
poses unknown to the donors. Mr. Barksdale, a descendant from the 
old stock, resisted, and Chancellor Dunkin ruled in favor of the powers 
that be — the modern vestry, stating, "that a complete remedy exists 
through the quiet remedy of the ballot-box."' Mr. Hunt, before 
the appeal court (page 208), replied, "that the reference to the ballot- 
box is unfortunate in a case where the law is appealed to to protect 
the minority, which is its most honored function." This case he insists 
was a perversion of the law of public charities. There it stands, how- 
ever, and when no pressing antagonistic prejudices shall longer exist, 
this case will remain a simple, but characteristic monument of his 
claim to his professional rank. 

In the celebrated, case of Pell and Ball, !Mr. Hunt occupied a distin- 
guished part. Mr. and Mrs. Ball both perished in the Pulaski, a 
steamer blown up at sea. No witnesses saw either actually perish. 
The wife, however, was heard screaming for her husband, but amid the 
general confusion, no one could find him. On the fact, "whether the 
wife or husband was 'the survivor,' " an estate depended. This fact, a 
single judge undertook to decide; not by direct testimony, for there 
was none; but by the civil-law style of arguing. The opinion of 
Chancellor Johnson ruled, "that the husband probably perished first, 
because he was a man and quietly went about to seek a rescue, and that 
his screaming wife, being the last ' heard from,' was the survivor, and the 
estate, thus vesting in her during the few seconds they were in '■articulo 
mortis,^ went to the wife's representatives." Mr. Hunt insisted that es- 
tates ought not to pass on such pure conjectures, and his argument is sub- 
mitted to the profession, and the good sense of the public, as conclusive. 

The next branch of this prolific case is in 1 Richardson's Chancery R. 
3G1, and 419, in which the jurisdiction and practice of the court of 
equity are directly called in question. Mr. Hunt in that court 
challenged the circuit decree of Chancellors Johnson and Harper, that 
an appeal from the circuit decree did not ^;cr se act as a supersedeas. 
He waived all British authorities and relied on the statute of the state 
establishing the appeal court. Judges Johnson and Harper placed 
their decree on the cases of Riggs and Murray, Green and Winter, (3 
Johnston's Chan, cases, 70, IGO.) "that an appeal does not suspend 
the execution of a decree, and until reversed, it operates as a full 
authority to the officers acting under it" (p. 360). Mr. Hunt chal- 
lenged this, as a decision in the very teeth of the law of South 
Carolina, and the express rule of the court, " that no execution to 
enforce a decree could issue until thirty days after the final decree 
of the appeal court." Nevertheless, it is true, that he proved to 
demonstration that neither of the chancellors had ever read the case on 
which they relied as authority, for it was exactly an authority the 
other way, but in no manner was it an authority in South Carolina,. 



408 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

whose own laws ruled the case.* The bold manner in which Mr. Hunt 
charged the court in this case, with clear and palpable error, may 
imply that he is no favorite with the bench. Such, if true, may be 
accounted for in tiie lact that he believes the election of a man to 
the bench, if he is of fairly balanced intellect, may strengthen his re- 
solve to mete out equal justice to all, yet he has always denied that it 
conveyed any such exemption from intellectual or moral infirmities 
that admit no possibility of error. Believing all men liable to the 
infirmities of our nature, from which even an election to the bench 
does not entirely exonerate them, he has seen too many instances 
in which personal antipathies, or personal predilections, if they have not 
corrupted, have misled. That judges have listened to tales outside the 
sanctuary, affecting the moral justice of cases that never could have 
passed legitimately its threshold ; thus the scales of justice become 
uneven, and her bandage becomes mesmeiically luminous, and enables 
a judge to see who will gain, and who will lose by his decree. 
No honest lawyer, who is not afraid to tell the truth, can deny that he 
has seen favored lawyers who will exercise undue influence beyond the 
law and the facts, or that judges have sat in judgment on the rights 
of men, who stood a better chance than absolute indifference would 
have left them. It is within the range, at least of possibility, that 
a judge may be so self-confident in his own integrity, as to sit in judg- 
ment when his relations to the party would render a man who pos- 
sessed a more nervous conscience, to distrust himself, and in all such 
cases, a lawyer owes it as a duty to warn hiin, and by ceasing to push 
himself into such cases a judge may at least '• avoid the appearance of 
evil." Let each lawyer say, if he has not often calculated ''who 
would hold the next court," not purely to select the best talent, but to 
get a judge whose prepossessions at least are not adverse, 

Mr. Hunt has never asked any other favor than to be listened to, by 
a court willing to get at all the facts, and weigh all the legal authori- 
ties and principles adduced. When so treated he has never come in 
collision with any member of the bench. It is true, he speaks plain 
English, and intends to speak the truth, and no one rejoices more in 
repairing an inadvertent error ; but he can never be turned aside 
by mere power or fear of consequences. But when a judge refuses, 
with cold indifference, to answer his positions, or even rule against 
him, he is certainly rather impatient, and does not often fliil to indi- 
cate it very unequivocally. The slightest exhibition of arbitrary power 
by a judge raises his indignation ; and some of his finest bursts of elo- 
quence have been on occasions of this kind. He maintains that judges 
.ore the paid servants of the people, not the owners of judicial authority ; 
that the bar represent the people, "their well-approved good masters," 
and are entitled to a patient and respectful hearing, and to a fair and 
impartial decision, without favor or aflection ; and that true judicial 
dignity is most surely obtained by an upright and civil performance 
of judicial functions. He insists, therefore, that a lawyer is as much 
a public functionary as a judge, and in his place equally independent. 
His argument, at page 382, gives an almost ludicrous view of the 
gravity of quoting a wrong case. The late Mr. Bailey, attorney-general, 

* See note at end of memoir. 



409 

supported Mr. Hunt in the same case, and, at page 384, confirms the 
position that the court was *' right wrong." These two branches of the 
case of Pl-11 and Ball place Mr. Hunt where his friends are willing to 
leave him.* 

In relation to the equity juiisdiction, to which he prefers to limit his 
practice, he regards the system of South Carolina as wholly behind the 
age. The necessity of requiring a defendent to answer on oath, and 
thus purge what he may not possess — a conscience — is absurd. His 
testimony, if voluntarily asked for, is required at peril. But to ex- 
tend to every defendant a right to answer all direct allegations, is 
only equaled by the still greater absurdity which gives to such an in- 
terested answer not only the efi'ect of ordinary disinterested testimony 
but even renders it conclusive, unless controverted by two positive 
witnesses, or one with corroborating circumstances. This iniquitous 
rule, which has banished more than half the practice from the court, is 
a remnant of monkish pretension. The defendant is supposed to be 
put to his purgation by the interrogatories of the bill, and his father 
confessor, the court, is supposed to scour him out, and exhibit the truth 
of what he knows, believes, or has heard. As Chancery is no longer 
a court of conscience, but a place to administer the law, according to 
the more comprehensive rules of equity, Mr. Hunt considers such pro- 
ceedings the merest folly. He objects also to the very unsatisfactory 
mode of obtaining testimony. Under existing circumstances a master 
or commissioner is neither a judge nor a jury, and has no risht to give 
his opinion on testimony, although it is the practice to do so. He 
should simply record facts, otherwise it only acts as an excuse for the 
judge to avoid the responsibility of deciding himself, and places suitors 
in the power of a weak, prejudiced, or ignorant master. He maintains 
that it is still more against principle for the appeal court to refuse to 
review a decision of the master, on facts, when the circuit judge coin- 
cides, which he may do to avoid the necessity of a strict consideration 
of the case. It is this very imperfect mode of ascertaining the truth of 
facts that destroys public confidence in our courts of equity. Mr, Hunt 
very properly maintains that if the defect is not remedied the court 
will be superseded, and its rules and principles retained to be applied 
to facts more satisfactorily established. 

Mr. Hunt's views on the subject of special pleading are equally clear 
and simple. He holds special pleading to be a severe logical system. 
But, as lawyers and judges are not always strict logicians, its rules are 
so liable to be perverted and turned to purposes of chicanery, delay 
and false issues, that it has degenerated into a wretched system of pro^ 



* The case of the state of South Carolina against the banks of that state, reported 
by the late Attorney-General Bailey, contains Mr, Hunfs artjument in full in that 
case. The question was. whether the suspension of specie payments by the banks 
worked a forfeiture of their charters. This argument states fully Mr. Hunt's views 
of the nature and obligations of bank charters, and was well considered by the 
Court of Errors, who sustained his position. In this case the attorney-general ex- 
hibited his extensive learning and great power of argument. Colonel Hunt was 
associated with him by the governor of the state. The report of this case, with the 
arguments in full, occupies a large octavo volume, and was published l>y order of the 
legislature of South Carolina. The case was one of great importance, and com- 
prises all the law of banking and bank corporations, and as such, is extremely valu- 
able to the mercantile as well as to the legal portion of the community. 



410 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

fessional and technical peculation * In the beginning, pleadings were 
settled by the judge from the oral statements of the litigants. But 
when pleading was committed to the lower orders of the law, it became 
a science of quirks and quibbles, and even all the learning of the Eng- 
lish bench has been unable to save special pleading from universal and 
well-merited obloquy. ISor would Mr. Hunt destroy the old plan 
without a remedy. lie prefers such rules of practice as will present 
the points at issue plainly and clearly, and especially notify both par- 
ties what they are to litigate, and thus avoid the trickery of snap-judg 
ments and nonsuits on points not affecting the true merits of the case. 
In short, he esteems the law too grand and elevated a profession for its 
members to devote so much of their time and study to low trickery 
and disingenuous prevarications. 

In his arguments, he insists that the great requisites in a good 
judge, is a proper appreciation of facts. The habit of catching at an 
isolated fact and applying it to some old legal saw is the very character- 
istic of a self-important and downright pettifogger. A case is no more 
dependent on one fact than the countenance is on one feature. There 
may be, and is, in all faces, one leading outline, but the full expression 
and character depend entirely on the grouping of all the parts. It is so 
much easier and saves so much labor to seize on one fact and one fa- 
miliar rule than to compare all the facts with all therules and the proper 
deductions, that inferior minds seldom take such trouble. The instance of 
Lord Eldon is an admonition in point. He doubted, and reviewed, and 
reconsidered all his cases carefully, but he said that, ''although he may 
have delayed cases, he felt a satisfaction in the reflection, that he never 
took an estate from one who was justly entitled to it, or gave one to a 
person who had no good right to it."' Mr. Hunt often illustrates this 
truth by bringing up cases which, at the first blush appearing hopeless, 
are listened to with impatience by those slightly considering them. Al- 
though there may appear an air of boldness and novelty in most of Mr. 
Hunt's legal positions, as presented in the books, yet, when well comai- 
dered, they will be seldom fiund to deviate from the sound rules of law. 

Among his most successful cases was the celebrated " Jewel case," 
argued in the Supreme Court of the United States. In this case he was 
matched by that accomplished lawyer and scholar, the late Attorney- 
General, Hugh S. Legare. Mr. Legare admitted the case to be a fair 
trial of his strength. Sanguine of a complete triumph over Mr. Hunt, 
he stated to one of the judges of that court, that " if there ever was a 



* It is a somewhat singular fact, that over three-quarters of the decisions reported 
in the older books were decided and adjudicated on purely technical grounds, involv 
inn- merely the niceties of special pleadinjr, without in any wav touchinn; or afTectinc 
the merits of the question at issue between the parties. In this way the blunders 
of the lawyer must be paid for by the client, perhaps in ruin and desolation. There 
are many instances on record, where judjres have confessed that their decisions 
have worked great hardship, and. upon \.\\e facts, perhaps, should have been decided 
the other way. Every lawyer familiar with the old reports will perceive at once 
the truth of the above observation, and the correctness of Mr. Hunt's views on this 
subject. The doctrine of stare decisis is at once wholesome and injurious. An 
enlightened judiciary can alone discriminate between the evil and the good, aided 
oy the Bound views and practical experience of able lawyers and jurists. — Ed. 



411 

case suited to his powers it was this." After a full argument, in which 
he had the reply, Mr. Hunt was successful. The case was briefly this: 
"Jewel in early life, being a Jew, intermarried with a young refugee 
from St. Domingo, and lived with her upwards of twenty years, during 
which time they had born to them, seven or eight children, who became 
grown-up and respectable men. She lived in Charleston with him, and 
was always called and treated as his wife, even to the execution of 
a release of dower, on the sale of some real estate. But the actual 
ceremony which took place thirty years before the trial, was not the 
subject of written proof. After aiding in accumulating his estate, she, 
growing old. Jewel married again according to the full ceremonies 
of the Jews, a young Hebrew, by whom he had several children. He 
lived with his last wife in Louisiana, but on a voyage returning from 
New-York, he was drowned at sea." The question was, " who were 
the heirs at law of his estate ?" In a word, " which set of children were 
legitimate?" both having acquired great respectability. A case' in 
ejectment, for a trifling piece of property made the case. The verdict 
was for the first set of children. An appeal carried the case to Wash- 
ington, and involved the whole question of lawful marriages. Mr. 
Legare brought all the rich resources of his legal learning to the case, 
and felt sure of success. After the opening for the appellant, one of 
the ablest lawyers of the New- York bar, then attending at court, said 
to Mr. Hunt, "You will lose this case!" !Mr. Hunt's reply was: 
'■'■ Audi alteram partem y When Mr. Hunt had concluded an argument 
of two days, the critic began to question his prediction, and the opinion of 
Judge Taney settled his doubts. The contemporaneous opinions of the 
press abroad, to whom ]\Ir. Hunt was an utter stranger, are the best evi- 
dence of the effect of this forensic effort. Of the interest which this case 
created at the time, and of the able manner in which it was conducted, 
argued and decided, all the Washington correspondents at the time, speak 
in high terms of appreciation. A writer in the United States Gazette 
thus describes it: "Mr. Hunt occupied the whole of yesterday, with- 
out concluding, in an argument which, foi" beauty and terseness of Ian 
guage, cogency of argument, force of reasoning, profoundness of 
research and legal learning, has rarely been surpassed, even in this 
theatre (if I may be allowed thus to express myself), where the great 
minds of the nation meet and grapple in manly and generous conflict." 

Under circumstances highly flattering to his reputation, Mr. Hunt 
has also been called to argue cases out of the state. He has extended 
his practice to Georgia, where he was employed in a very interesting 
case : that of the Executors of Wightman vs. Dewes, in which the pre- 
sent Judge Berrian, then at the bar, was on the other side. In Newark,. 
New-Jersey, he also argued the case touching the will of the late 
Thomas Gibbons, assisted by Judge Hornblower and Governor Pen- 
nington, of that state, and opposed by David B. Ogden and George 
Wood, of New-York, two of the ablest lawyers in the United States. 
The case excited deep interest, and to the bar there must be referred 
the character of his argument. 

He was also engaged in the City of New- York in the case of Stoney 
against Dudley and Stuyvesant, and established the first mortgage, 
although unrecorded, against the subsequent one to the Josephs and 



412 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICAHS. 

Others, and thus secured twenty valuable lots of ground to his clients. 
The bankrupt case of Laft'an and Redmond, he argued before Judge 
Betts in the same city, and again sustained the reputation of the 
Carolina bar. Last year, before Judge Woodbury, at Boston, he 
argued the ciise of B. D. Ilerriott and Son vs. Assignees of Smith, 
affecting directly the question of cash purchases on the «ve of in- 
solvency, and succeeded fully to the extent of the fund. (Generally, 
however, he has confined his practice to the courts of South Carolina 
and to the Supreme Court of the United States.* 

In Washington he is on neutral ground, and takes his appropriate 
stand free from all local predilections or prejudices, for the impar- 
tiality of strangers is more reliable than opinions formed by rivals. 

But in citing cases in which he has appeared, we only weary the at- 
tention of our readers. Clear as the demonstration appears when com- 
mitted to paper, it is only when the mathematician himself works out 
his problem that all its beauty and logic are apparent. So with Mr. 
Hunt. To appreciate his full powers, he must be seen and heard on 
some great occasion. No matter how high public expectation may have 
been raised, he has never Veen known to fall below it. What, it may 
be asked, has given him such power ? The answer is plain. A mind 
singularly active and full of natural strength, and withal so well trained 



* The case of Lambert and Brothers an-ainst the ship Martha and ov\Tiers, in ad- 
miralty, argued before the Supreme Court of the United States at \\'ashington. dur- 
ing its last session, and decided recently by that court, (though not yet published,) 
was the last distinguislied legal triumph in Mr Hunt's career. The District and Cir- 
cuit Courts at Charleston, in a case of libel in admiralty against Abraham Rich 
and others, owners of the ship Martha of Boston, alleging damages sustained by the 
cargo in a voyage from Liverpool to Charleston, condemned the vessel to be sold, 
and the amount of damages ascertained by the register, and all costs of the litiga- 
tion, to be paid out of the fund. Col. Hunt contended that the injury to the cargo 
was caused by sea risks, excepted out of the bill of lading, and was a loss to be 
borne by the insurers, and not by the owners as common carriers. The court be- 
low having very peremptorily overruled him, the case was carried by appeal at once 
to the Supreme Court of the United States at Washington, where it was argued 
in February last, by Mr. Hunt, and Mr. George Evans, of Maine, for the appellants, 
and Mr. Coxe and Judge Butler, of South Carolina, for the appellees. The case at 
circuit had been carefully prepared by B. F. Hunt and son, the proctors on record. 
Twenty witnesses from Boston, and as many from New-York, comprising the most 
experienced officers of insurance companies, masters of vessels, and importing mer- 
chants, were examined by them upon commission. After the circuit decree, one 
point, the seavv'orthiness of the vessel at the time of leaving Liverpool, was still fur- 
ther fortified, by issuing a new commission, read for the first time in the Supreme 
Court, according to the admiralty practice. The reply on the argument fell to Mr. 
Hunt as senior counsel. His success was as astounding to the bar and mercantile 
public in Charleston, as it was in itself complete. All the judges, except the judge 
whose decree was reversed, united with Mr. Justice Nelson, who read the decision, 
in reversing the decree of the court below, and on the precise grounds taken on the 
appeal. 

It is the intention, we understand, of Mr. Hunt to devote himself hereafter to 
practice in the Supreme Court of the United States at Washington, and have a 
resident associate there to prepare business, as that city is more accessible than 
many districts of his own state. His efforts in that court, have hitherto been 
almost uniformly successful, and conclusively attest that it is the tribunal where 
long experience and professional industry will ever find the most adequate remu- 
neration. — Ed. 



BENJAMIN F. HUNT, OF SOUTH CAROLINA. 413 

by constant and judicious exercise as to improve by art all that nature 
ever gave it- Quictc to perceive, ingenious to plan, bold to execute, 
always hopeful, willing, and able to encounter either mental^or bodily 
labor to an almost incredible extent ; not exultant in victory or cast 
down by defeat — these are the elements that would make any man 
great, and are characteristic of the subject of this memoir. 

The same traits which have marked Colonel Hunt's professional 
career belong to him as a legislator. On entering the legislature of 
South Carolina, after an interval of some years, he was placed at the 
head of the committee on Federal relations. To this committee all 
matters concerning the laws and operations of the general government 
are entrusted, and his reports upon the leading questions of the day — 
the tariff, the tenure of the presidential office, and the distribution of 
the sales of the public lands, are elaborate and well written, and have 
been received as texts-books of states-rights' democracy. 

On the subject of the tariff, he maintained the doctrine that the 
general welfare clause gave no sanction to protection ; that it was a 
fraud upon the donors; and a breach of trust to distribute the sales of 
the public lands among the states, expressly given for general and 
national uses. He maintained that to render an incumbent ineligible 
for a second term of the presidency, was in fact to fetter the people, 
who have a right to elect whom they please, and that a faithful dis- 
charge of duty to their satisfaction ought not to be a disqualification, 
since in time of war it might be vitally important to avoid any 
executive change. 

He maintains the wisdom of placing a qualified veto, as designated 
by the constitution, in the president, to protect the public from ill-con- 
sidered wid hasty legislation ; that the president being the chosen repre- 
sentative of the people is the proper guardian of their interests ; that if 
two third of Congress will not sustain a measure, by him considered 
of doubtful constitutionality, it is safer to give it up. 

In 1842 Colonel Hunt retired from the committee on Federal rela- 
tions, and was made chairman of the Judiciary committee, by far the 
most important and responsible office in the state. "With the excep- 
tion of a single term, he has presided over this committee ever since. 

Of Mr. Hunt's usefulness as a legislator, not a session passes without 
evoking from every quarter the highest commendation of his labors. 
We never knew a man who represented his constituency more faithfully, 
and we very much doubt if there ever was a legislator who attended to 
his duties more industriously, and with greater usefulness. The follow- 
ing, from the Winyaw Observer of 1842, published in Georgetown, 
South Carolina, is a tribute of praise, in the justness of which exevy menv 
ber of the South Carolina legislature will unite: 

" Colonel Hunt is one of the most useful, able, and efficient legislators 
we have ever known — a real workiyuf man. as his many able, instruc- 
tive, and, we believe, always successful reports at the two last sessions 
most amply evince; — indefatigably industrious and persevering, re- 
markably clear-headed, sound-principled, and well-informed ; never 
speaking or acting but to enlighten the subject, and excite the interest 
and respect even of those who differ Irom him, and never wasting a 
moment either of his own time or that of the house. He is truly a 



414 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMBBICANS. 

most valuable acquisition to the legislature — a man to whom the whole 
democratic people of the state may well feel deeply grateful for his most 
able and efficient labors in their cause, both in and out of it, and whose 
public services they might well deeply regret the loss of — a loss we 
trust they will not soon have to experience." 

The constitution of South Carolina contains many anti-democratic 
features, against which Mr. Hunt has been battling for years. One of 
the most objectionable is the life tenure of judges. He holds that age 
ought not to prove a disqualification. One man is older at fifty than 
another at sixty ; but a life tenure is a violation of all the analogies of 
a republican government. We choose a governor for two years, a re- 
presentative for two years, and a senator for four years. These last 
make the laws, but a judge holds for life. This is wholly against prin- 
ciple. Each generation has the right to choose its own rulers, legisla- 
tive or judicial ; but a judge, elected twenty years ago, may still hold 
office when the generation that elected him is gone. The people alone 
continue sovereign. A man is chosen a judge before he is tried. He 
may disappoint all expectations, and yet he is fastened on the state for 
life, without the people having any redress. He ought, at least, to pass 
a probation. The people seldom do any lasting wrong. Ail their in- 
terests prompt them to select pure and able men. If judges were re- 
sponsible, at intervals, to the people, they would be careful to deserve 
re-election. Independence in the judiciary is desirable, but the advan- 
tage of being independent of the sovereign power itself is not so clear. 
In time, people will wonder why they adhered so long to a thing thus 
against principle, as to except judges out of all other magistrates. A 
life tenure is purely a monarchical feature in our jurisprudence. Sena- 
tors, representatives, and governors, are trusted no longer than four 
years without being again approved by the people, and yet we perpe- 
tuate a judge, perhaps elected to get him out of the way of an impatient 
aspirant to his official emoluments of pra!ctice. There he must remain 
through a long life, perhaps an incumbrance to the administration of 
justice, and an example of the lingering love of our people to the aristo- 
cratic and monarchical usages of our English progenitors. Col. Hunt 
holds the life tenure of judges a practical reproach upon the provisions 
relative to all the other chief agents of the people who are periodically 
called on to give an account of their stewardship. He regards it as 
demonstrating how slowly republican principles supplant monarchical 
practices in the conservative State of South Carolina, and how hesitating 
some men still are of the ultimate good sense and true conservatism of 
a fi'ee and educated people. 

Mr. Hunt has been frequently called upon to act the orator on public 
occasions and at popular gatherings. He has never failed to satisfy. 
Nor has the satisfaction been confined to his spoken addresses only ; he 
is equally successful in print. One of his most elaborate orations was 
that before the Washington Society of Charleston, delivered on the 4th 
day of July, 1839. In expansiveness of thought, philosophy of reflec- 
tion, force and vividness of expression, in the clear development of the 
causes which have produced the American Revolution, and in the wise 
exposition of the best means of perpetuating its principles, this will well 
compare with any similar production in our country. 



BENJAMIN F. HUNT, OF SOUTH CAROLINA. 415 

In 1840, Colonel Hunt was invited to address a mass meeting of the 
demcicracy in tlie Park in the city of New-York. His speech on that 
occasion elicited the highest commendation from friends and foes. It 
■was delivered at the same moment ]\Ir. Webster addressed the mer- 
chants of the same city at the corner of Wall and William streets. In- 
deed a portion of Mr. Webster's speech was stJ'uck ofl' and handed to 
Mr. Hunt while speaking on that occasion. A few days after tliis he ad- 
dressed the democratic young men of Boston at Faneuil Hall, and made 
what his friends considered one of his best eil'orts. Even tlie whig papers 
admitted that it put their party to tlicir best to reply to it; and the re- 
putation of the speech was followed by another invitation to appear on 
a similar occasion before the democrats of iSalcm. At Ncw-Ydi k, iVom 
fifteen to twenty thousand persons attended to hear him, and all who 
were present speak of the triumphant manner in which he acquitted 
himself. Of the Boston speech, the editor of the Charleston Mercury 
thus writes : 

"At the creat meeting of our ^Massachusetts friends the other day, 
Mr. Wtiodbury, ' the Rock of New-England Democracy,' made a speech 
which was powerful in its cft'ect, and which, to judge from a report that 
professes to be no more than a mere sketch, must have been unusually 
interesting, insisting as it does upon that equality which involves the 
simple justice, which is all the South demands, and which usurpation 
would hazard the Union in withholding, by making the confederacy a 
burden and curse instead of an advantage and a convenience to the 
several states which ordained it. We wish it had been fully reported. 

"He was followed by Col. Hunt, of this city, in a speech chiefly de- 
voted to the Te.xas question, of which also we regret to have received 
no more than a meagre sketch, and which, judging ex pcde Hercidem was 
as succcsst'ul and effective as i\Ir. Woodbury's. It was received with the 
greatest enthusiasm, and the Boston Times eulogizes the merits of Col. 
Hunt as a speaker very liighly ; but not a whit overmuch, as all who 
have heard him thoroughly warmed on a great political question can 
avouch, and which those who never having heard him will readily con- 
jecture, if they will read his speech delivered in the Park at New-York, 
in which he met Daniel Wei)ster upon every point of an elaborate 
haran<zu(\ and sijrnallv defeated him on all. The name of the old Hall 
Faneuil is part of his own name, and the kindred associations it excited, 
could not have failed to inspirit him on the late occasion. He ought to 
have his speech reported fully. He is always strong, even when wrong,- 
and when right he makes a deep and lasting impression from the di- 
rectness and true vigor of his language." 

The speech was afterwards published end hailed by democrats all 
over the Union as a most noble and unanswerable vindication of their 
principles. 

In 1844, while on a professional tour to Savannah, he was again 
called on to address the democracy of that place. The speech, which 
was published, did much tor the cause in Georgia, and while the whig 
papers denounced the conclusiveness of its arguments, all of them ad- 
mitted its ingenuity and force. The Savannah Georgian, a democratic 
paper, says that 

" The speech of Col. Hunt did not disappoint his audience, and this 



41G SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

speaks volumes in its praise. It was one of the ablest efforts of the 
human mind which we have ever had the pleasure of hearing. He ar- 
gued the propriety of the immediate annexation of Texas with a force 
of lo"ic which cuuld not have failed to convince any doubter who might 
have heard him. His remarks upon the character of the democratic 
candidates, and upon the nature of the present political contest, were 
just — all of them just and true to a word. The contrast which he drew 
between the two political parties of the country, in relation to their 
devotion to men and principles, was clear and striking. The whigs of 
the country, like the blind disciples of the Grecian jihilosophcrs, look 
up for direction to the ?)jsc dixit of Mr. Clay; and when asked why 
they support this measure, or oppose that, their only answer is, 'The 
master says so.' It were useless for us to attempt to portray the power 
of eloquence and of argument displayed by our distinguished guest. 
When he had concluded, no one could have been surprised at the fact, 
that his voice had gone with more power to the hearts of the people in 
Faneuil Hall, than the voice of the great man of Massachusetts him.- 
Belf, and that Daniel Webster found a hard customer to deal with in 
this able Carolinian. What wonder is it that the people of Carolina are 
60 proud of their great men?" 

Within the present year, Mr. Hunt has been bereaved in the loss of 
liis wife, a Carolina lady, whom he married early in life She has left 
iiim three sons and a daughter. One of the former is his associate in 
business. 

Col. Hunt's extensive practice and constant employment have chiefly 
absorbed his time, and in a measure restricted his opportunities for so- 
cial intei-course. When, however, he does indulge in society, few men 
are more pleasant or entertaining. Full of information, racy in anec- 
dote, and large in the experiences of the world, it is seldom that any 
one converses with him without learning'Something new and instructive. 

He is now in his sixty-fust year. His faculties are in unimpaired 
vigor, and time has only given additional impressiveness to a person, 
always commanding, dignified and manly. Of his early struggles, of 
the intrepidity with which he encountered and overcame them, of his 
numerous triumphs as a lawyer, of his usefulness as a legislator, of his 
splendid achievements as an orator, and of the manliness and indepen- 
dence of his character, we could add much to what we have already 
written. But we must forbear. When his full course shall have been 
run, those better qualified than ourselves shall gather the many memo- 
rials of his life, and do them fitting honor before his countrymen. 



NOTE, BY A MEMBER OF THE NEW-YORK BAR. 

The novelty and the pravitv of the charge maJe by Colonel Hunt and the late 
attorney-general, Mr. Bailey, who was alike distinguished forlearnini^r and accuracy, 
has induced us to look into this matter. If the allegations are true, they serve to 
illustrate still further the tenacity of Colonel Hunt in practising at all before a tri- 
bunal which can be so blinded by its antipathies, but renders the admitted fact of 
his unusual success still more remarkable, and imposes upon the friends of both 
Judges Johnson and Harper — and, indeed, all the court of error who signed the 
decree — no slight obligation to vindicate their judicial character hy some conclusive 
refutation of the fact, that Colonel Hunt, or rather his client, Nonus Ball, wa* 



BENJAMIN F. HUNT, OF SOUTH CAROLINA. 417 

denied the benefit of an appeal secured by the constitution of South Carolina, and 
that his lands and slaves were sold pending an appeal upon the very question whe- 
ther he was entitled to have them delivered to him under partition ! If true, South 
Carolina must re-organize her appeal system, or lose that precious reputation which 
she has hitherto sustained. Our knowledge of her courts of equity is chiefly derived 
from Chancellor De Saussure's first volume of reports. We there find both the acts 
of her legislature and her rules of court. By these it appears that, in 1808, the state was 
subdivided into equity circuits, and a court of appeals established. 1 Dess. Reports, 
p. 91-93, the law expressly provides "how appeals are to be made." The 25th 
rule, made two years after, is thus : " 25. No execution or attachment for the en- 
forcement of a decree shall issue until thirty days after the rising of the court during 
which such decree was pronounced ; and if there he an appeal, then such execution 
shall not issue until thirty days after the adjournment of the court of appeals at which 
the cause shall be determined," ^-c. 

If language has any meaning, the course of both Chancellors Harper and Johnson 
will render them liable in an action to this young man ; and no title to his lands can 
be good under a sale so palpably illegal ; at least no other civilized people would sub- 
mit to so clear a wrong. We confess that the enormity of this case of Pell and 
Ball leaves us in doubt how we can trust our own conclusions ; and yet, there is 
the report, and here is the rule. When we advert to the cases quoted from Chan- 
cellor Kent, in our own reports, our wonder is increased ; for it is not to be ques- 
tioned that no authority is found here that an appeal from the circuit is not a super- 
sedeas, but the very reverse ; and we fear that, instead of reading for themselves, 
these learned chancellors leaned too much upon counsel, who, in their own cases, 
are not safe judicial monitors. The decision would render appeals all but a delu- 
sion ; and yet so scrupulous was South Carolina on this point, that in her very con- 
stitution she secured to her citizens the benefit of an appeal. 

The case of Green vs. Winter (1st Johnson's Chancery Rep., p. 79) was heard in 
June, 1814 ; and the very point of the case, and all its authority, depends upon a 
statement of how the case came up. It was a petition, stating the previous pro- 
ceedings, from the filing of the bill to the decree. An appeal had been taken, and 
the petition prayed " that the cause might proceed, notwithstanding the appeal." 
Chancellor Kent decided (p. 82) "that the application for leave to proceed, &c., is 
denied with costs." How learned judges can rely on such a decision as authority 
for the position that an appeal is no supersedeas, passes all conjecture. 

The whole matter is, that in the English Chancery, until 1798, long after the 
Revolution, an appeal to the-House ofLords did work a supersedeas. Since then, 
the question, whether it shall or not, depends on rules and orders adapted to each 
particular case. But Chancellor Kent is explicit, and the subsequent cases where, 
on motion of the appellee, special order was made to preserve the fund, pending 
the appeal, so far from weakening the rule sustains it, and so an ordinary acquaint- 
ance with the reports would prove. From the case of Green and Winter we learn 
that Lord Chancellor Apsley, in Pomfret r^-. Smith, Wyatt's Prac. Reg., 35, 36, 
decided " that the practice, on appeal to the House of Lords, was, that the chancel- 
lor's jurisdiction was susperseded, only as to the matter appealed from." In this 
case the matter appealed from was the authority of a circuit chancellor to sell the 
real estate and slaves of young Ball. Chancellor Kent says, " I believe the prac- 
tice in this court has always been according to tiie more ancient opinion in the 
English chancery, and the appeal has been considered as a stay of proceedings. 
This appears also to have been the understanding of this court as declared in the 
35th. 36th, and 37th rules of June 1806. My conclusion is, that an appeal does, in 
the first instance, stay proceedings on the point appealed from, and that, if any 
party wishes to proceed, notwithstanding the appeal, he must make application to 
the chancellor for leave to proceed," &c. The difference between the English practice 
and ours is, that by the former the plaintiff must apply for an order to stay proceed 
ings, but here the defendant in appeal must apply for leave to proceed. M. 



27 



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SAMUEL ANDERSON, OF TENNESSEE. 419 

HON. SAMUEL ANDERSON, 

OF MORFREESBORo'j TENN. 

The subject of this sketch was born on the 5th of January, 1787, in 
Rockbridge county, Virginia. His parents were of Scotch and Irish 
descent. Their religious creed was of the Presbyterian faith, and he 
was educated according to the strict and rigid rules required by the 
standards of that church. 

In the year 1800, his father removed with his family to Knox county, 
Tennessee, and settled about seven miles from Knoxville. He had a 
large family, and being in moderate circumstances, the present judge 
was compelled to work on the farm with his you;iger brothers, until he 
attained the age of twenty-one. 

His oldest brother, however, was sent to school, with a view to ob- 
tain as good an education as the literary institutions in the country at 
that day could furnish. He finished his collegiate course at Washing- 
ton College, near Lexington, Rockbridge county, Virginia. 

Samuel Anderson obtained from him a smattering knowledge of 
Latin and Greek, and some of the sciences. Shortly after becoming of 
age, he commenced the study of the law. He obtained a license in 
the winter of 1810, being then in his twenty- third year. He practised 
in Knoxville and some of the adjoining counties, until early in the year 
1811, when he settled in Murfreesboro', where he has ever since re- 
sided. He represented the county of Rutherford in the legislature of 
hisstate in 1817 and 1819, and the called session of 1820. In the winter 
of 1835, he was appointed by the then governor judge of the fifth judicial 
circuit of the State of Tennessee, to fill the vacancy occasioned by the 
resignation of the Hon. James C. Mitchell, He was elected by the 
legislature judge of the same circuit, under the new constitution, for the 
term of eight years, in the fall of 1835 ; was again elected in the fall 
of 1843 for another term of eight years. 




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WILLARD HALL, OF DELAWARE. 421 

HON. WILLARD HALL, 

OF DELAWARE. 

WiLLARD Hall, District Judge of the United States for Delaware 
district, is a native of Massachusetts. He was born at Westford, in 
the county of Middlesex, the twenty-fourth of December, 1780 : his 
father, Willis Hall, was born and died in that town; his mother, Mehe- 
table Pool, was of Hollis, New-Hampshire. 

His grandfather, Willard Hall, was a graduate of Harvard College, 
in the class of 1722. He was, soon after, ordained and settled the first 
pastor of Westford, erected, just before his settlement, into a town ; the 
west part of the territory of Chelmsford being set off for that purpose. 
He has been represented as a pious, useful minister. Dr. Payson, fifty 
years ago pastor of Chelsea, near Boston, spoke in strong terms of the 
gratification of having been acquainted >vith him, and mentioned as re- 
markable the clearness and strength of his mind. He united the 
offices of pastor and physician : the condition of society at the 
time extending greatly his usefulness. He was a strenuous sup- 
porter of common education. The town, on one occasion, con- 
sidering themselves excused by a special emergency from laying 
the required school taxes, he complained to the General Court, and 
arraigned his own charge before that tribunal. In this he offended, as 
he knew he should, many of his people ; but he would make no com- 
promise with delinquency in this matter. He was a man of taste in 
agriculture ; he had a good farm ; he cultivated fruit trees, plums, apri- 
cots, peaches, pears, apples, currants, black, white and red ; his garden, 
his orchards, his fields, years after his death, bearing witness to his 
skill and industry. 

In consequence of an academy being instituted in Westford, in 1792, 
Willard Hall, the grandson, was placed in the way of a liberal edu- 
cation. He entered that academy with the first scholars. He was 
prepared for college at the Harvard commencement in 1794, and then 
was examined and received ; but he returned and continued another 
year at the academy, and entered the freshman class of 1795. The 
disposition then seems to have been to protract the term of education. 
Now, a contrary disposition prevails, that leads — instead of entering 
freshman two years in succession, not to enter freshman at all, but 
overleap one, or, if it can possibly be done, two years of college 
course. The evil — the better expression is ruin — of this impatience of 
elementary education, is not properly considered : it is not examined 
and tested by experience so as to be understood. The writer has in 
view a gentleman of good natural endowments and estimable moral 
character, who has been delving at a profession twelve years or more, 
in barrenness, whose want of success, he believes, is attributable to 
having been unfortunately sent to a small, incompetent college, and 
acquiring there, for he could acquire no other, a superficial education. 
His education, instead of investing his mind with the elements of power, 



422 SKETCHES OF EMIKENT AMERICAKS. 

has formed it to feebleness — made it incapable of vigor and persevering 
strength. 

Judo-e Hall graduated at Harvard at the commencement of 1799, 

At the time of his leaving college, Groton, adjoining his native 
town, was distinguished by the residence of two eminent lawyers 
of the Middlesex bar, Timothy Bigelow and Samuel Dana. Mr. 
Bigelow was a man of great ability, and elevated moral and religious 
character. His speaking was rapid, rapid to a fault ; but it was earnest, 
energetic, and full of matter. He filled the circle in which he moved; 
but on the broad extent of his state and nation he never attained to the 
eminence that was due to him. Personal idolatry, so rife now, was 
then unknown. Mr. Dana was a good lawyer, a graceful speaker, 
with a melodious voice, an interesting gentleman. He abounded with 
anecdote ; there could be no more entertaining companion. Much in- 
structive personal history has been lost by his death. 

The offices of Mr. Bigelow and Mr. Dana were nurseries of lawyers. 
The recollection of them, in connection with the remark that has been 
made on the difference of the present from the former course of educa- 
tion, brings to mind an observation made by Mr. Dana to the writer 
long after he had left his office. Said he : " When you and others left 
my office, I had not a misgiving concerning you ; I was as confident of 
your success, as a farmer is of a crop from a well-cultivated field ; but 
that assurance is gone ; and for those now setting out I feel nothing but 
apprehension." 

Many had acquired the profession in these offices before the writer. 
Several were there with him. All became indebted for the tuition-fee ; 
and most fur something additional. On leaving, they gave their notes. 
He has been informed, and he does not doubt it, that nothing was ever 
lost of these notes. 

Judge Hall entered Mr. Dana's office, March, 1800. In March, 1803, 
he was admitted to the bar of Hillsborough county, New-Hampshire ; 
Mr. Dana practising in that county. Having read, in a speech in Con- 
gress of James A. Bayard, then the distinguished representative from 
Delawa.-e, some accounts of the bar in this state, placing it in an ele- 
vated moral position, and representing the practice as reasonably pro- 
ductive, he addressed to him a letter of inquiry. The gentlemanly and 
favorable answer of Mr. Bayard induced him to make choice of this state 
fur prosecuting his profession. 

He left his father's house in Westford, April 7, 1803 ; and traveling 
on horseback he reached Wilmington, Delaware, the 16th of that 
month ; from thence he proceeded to Georgetown, Sussex county, 
where the Court of Common Pleas was beginning its spring sessions. 
He had letters from the late H. G. Otis, of Boston, to Mr. Bayard and 
Mr. Rodney, and a record of his admission to the bar in New-Hamp- 
shire, and upon the application of Mr, Bayard, and a subsequent report 
of him and the late Rev, James P, Wilson, D. D,, of Philadelphia, 
then at the bar in Georgetown, Sussex, he was admitted an attorney 
and counselor of that court. In May, 1803, he settled at Dover, in 
the practice of law, and sedulously pursued this practice for twenty 
years. In this period he never allowed himself spare time sufficient 
to visit Massachusetts in modes of traveling then in use. He mar- 



VriLLABD HALL, OF DELAWARE. 423 

ried, and had one child ; he yearly devoted a fortnight to a change 
of air in Pennsylvania, to escape the intermittent fever of the level 
country of his residence. He always felt guilty in starting and 
returning on this excursion ; for he considered that professional ser- 
vices are needed by the community, and that a professional man is 
bound to make it convenient to the community to have the benefit of 
these services. He never saw father nor mother after leaving them, 
in April, 1803. 

Settling, a stranger among strangers, in a part of the country 
whose customs and manners were strange to him, without one auxiliary 
of patronage either of person oi circumstance, and in competition with 
gentlemen in prime and vigor of life, of commanding ability, first-rate 
education, held in highest personal esteem, in the rnidst of their own 
people and having a full start, his movement was slow, but progressive. 
It continued so. In 1811 he was appointed Secretary of State, and 
exercised this office till January, 1814. In 181G he was elected one of 
the representatives from the state to the Congress of the United States, 
and was re-elected in 1818. In 1821 he was again appointed Secretary 
of State ; in 1822 he was elected a member of the state Senate ; and in 
1823, May 6th, on decease of Judge Fisher, he was appointed by 
President Monroe District Judge of the United States for Delaware 
district. When this office was conferred, his practice at the bar was 
better than it had ever been, and increasing more certainly and substan- 
tially than it had ever done. But he was wearied with twenty years' 
labors and anxieties ; toiling harder for his clients than they would 
work for themselves, and feeling more deeply than they felt for their 
own interests. 

Upon the application of the General Assembly of Delaware, he re- 
vised the statutory laws of the state. He completed the work in 1829, 
reducing six volumes of laws, 3,G46 pages octavo, to one octavo 
volume, of which the public laws occupied 503 pages. In this revision 
he retained, in their own language, all old provisions, clearly expressed 
and unaffected by subsequent legislation. The mass of the laws did 
not admit of this. Upon most subjects the law was found in many 
acts amending, supplying, varying. In such cases his course was to 
determine the laws resulting from all the statutory provisions, and ex- 
press it in a bill prepared for the purpose, in plain, clear language, 
without redundancy, repealing all former acts in pari materia. It 
is believed, that from 1829 till 1852, when another revision was 
made, not a difficulty in practice, nor a vexed question, or perplexity, 
has been occasioned by this work. 

In 1831, a convention was called in Delaware to revise the constitu- 
tion. Judge Hall was then a resident of Wilmington, in Newcastle 
county, having removed from Dover in March, 1825. He was elected 
a delegate from Newcastle county to this convention, having been placed 
on the ticket of both parties. 

His views of democratic republicanism upon the engrossing subject 
of offices, found no favor on either side. These views were, that a demo- 
cratic republic consists of its citizens, each individual having place, and 
weight, and duty : individual talent, enterprise, industry and worthy . 
composing the common stock ; that every citizen, therefore, should 



424 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

have scope and inducement to employ to best advantage his talent, 
enterprise and energies ; that if there be two offices affording places for 
two men, when one office with one of them would be competent to 
discharge all the functions, there is the loss of a man, and even worse, 
for the two will probably become indolent, and be drones, while one 
discharging all the duties would be kept active, and by his energy be 
felt beyond his office in building up social improvement ; that this was 
not mere theorizing, for under his own observation several young men 
of highest promise, with advantages to be ornaments to society, had 
been allured by present apparent benefits into little offices, and de- 
stroyed, becoming idle, incapable and worthless. 

The question of offices should be determined with a sole view to the 
accommodation of the people, to be served through the functions. Their 
business should be done well, with as little expense and great conve- 
nience to them as consistent with justice to the office. If what is done 
in four offices can be done as well in one, by discontinuing three, and 
assigning the functions of four to one, the people will be served with 
more^ convenience and less expense to them; there will be a better 
officer, and he will be better supported. The republican view of the 
subject presents these considerations. It is utterly anti-republican to 
create offices for the sake of distributing favors to individuals. This 
is taxation — taxation of the most unjust and baneful nature, wantonly 
imposing public burden, injuring the favored men whose talents and 
industry urged to exertion in some useful pursuit, would gain a better 
living, and more influential standing, and harrassing the community by 
negligently executed offices. 

But the petty interests sustaining the opposite view are too strong to 
be overcome by argument. 

While Secretary of the State of Delaware, Judge Hall had advocated 
provision of public schools, and suggested a plan. In 1829 a com- 
mittee of the legislature applied to him for a bill forming a school sys- 
tem for the state. He drafted a bill which was passed, with the excep- 
tion of a provision conferring the power of taxation, omitted, not ac- 
cording to the judgment of the members, but through their apprehension 
of the unwillingness of the people. This feature was restored in a mo- 
dified form; but another important feature, that a school district should 
receive from the school-fund of the state no more than it raised in itself, 
was marred by allowing a district to draw its dividend upon raising the 
minimum sum of $25. With these variances, the school system of the 
etate is as framed by this bill. 

Under this system each county was divided into school districts; and 
to the school voters in each district was committed the power, in lawful 
meeting, to choose a school committee to provide a school open to all 
the white children of the district, and to raise money to enable them to 
discharge their duties, each school district being a community invested 
with power and responsibility to maintain a school for its youth, and the 
school voters being the fountain of this power and responsibility. 

It has been objected to the system that it is too democratic, resting 
on the will of the people, without inherent power for healthful action. 
The answer : — It adopts the vital principle of our civil polity, contain- 
hig the elements of all our institutions, and imparting to them form and 



WILLARD HALL, OF DELAWARE. 425 

life, viz. : that the people best understand their own interests, and are 
the trustworthy keepers and directors of them ; and that they for 
themselves, and none others for them, must concert and mature all 
plans for bettering their condition ; that this principle should pervade, 
and be practical everywhere in conducting all public concerns com- 
mitted to communities, so that the people shall be trained to discretion, 
intelligence, and sound judgment. The people need educating as well 
as the children; they have the power ; it can neither be reclaimed nor 
abridged ; the only safety, and therefore the course of wisdom, is in their 
learning to use it. The people of this country are in everything unlike 
those of the Old World. There they are to be amused, recreated, and 
kept contented": here they are to be trained into capacity, to under- 
stand and pursue the common good as their true and individual in- 
terest. Train the mass of the community in common schools, and se- 
lect classes in select schools, and by the process you plant the substra- 
tum of societv with roots of bitterness, diffusing noxiousness through 
the soil, and producing a most baneful growth. Feelings of child- 
hood influence through life; the disposition and temper remaining after 
the emotions in which they originated have passed away, and are 
forgotten. It cannot be disguised that great jealousies pervade com- 
munities. One class being supposed too high, prejudices are invoked 
and fostered to prostrate them. Men distinguished for ability and 
aptness to fill stations are not selected, because of jealousies arising 
from this very ability and aptness. Worth is thrown away ; common 
good sacrificed ; public detriment incurred of choice. The fact that the 
persons proscribed by the common opinion have never been a part of 
the mass, but have always moved in a separate sphere, has much to do 
m occasioning this result. It is essential to the prosperous action of orr 
institutions that all classes begin together, and go through an interesting 
part of their course in company. The counterpart of the disposition 
producing the mischief just noticed, can be formed only in childhood, 
A jealous temperament once formed cannot be corrected. Kemedies, 
apparently the most judicious, merely increase it. There is no calcu- 
lating the reciprocal influence in childhood of general association : that 
of the poor is as beneficial to the rich as that of the rich to the poor ; 
instilling and imbibing lessons of practical life that can be learned in no 
other way, and indispensable to the harmonious working of the whole 
community. 

Another objection has been made to this school system — that it 
allows countrv districts to be too large, as some scholars may be dis 
tant two miles from the school-house. This objection is noticed here 
to introduce the remark of the writer, that to the necessity which his 
home in childhood laid upon him to walk two miles and a half to 
school, going in the morning, returning at night, with a crust of bread 
in his pocket for his dinner, he attributes it that, with a constitution by 
no means robust, and at the age of twenty-two leaving New-England 
and settling in a climate deemed sickly, he has enjoyed uniform good 
health, rarely interrupted even by slight indisposition, and has reached 
an advanced period of life without feeling the pressure of age. Con- 
sidering how much is lost to business energy, and how much pain is 



42G SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

suffered in consequence of the debilitated frames of professional men, 
this remark may be of some value. 

Of the late James A. Bayard, whose name has occurred in this narra- 
tive, the writer may be allowed a passing notice. Jlis was not a noisy 
fame, but no man's was more solid. Those who knew him held him in 
the highest estimation : a man of elevated principle and commanding 
intellectual power. Mr. Madison, through admiration of his ability, 
appointed him, an opponent in politics, and a citizen of the smallest 
state, hence without local influence, on the commission with Albert 
Gallatin, John Quincy Adams, and Henry Clay, to maintain the rights 
and interests of this country in the negotiations at Ghent. 

The writer has heard some of the most eminent lawyers of this na- 
tion : Samuel Dexter, Luther Martin, William Pinkney, Daniel Web- 
ster, and others, and has knowledge of other distinguished members of 
the profession, but he has heard and has knowledge of no one whom he 
considers superior to Mr. Bayard. Of the bar of his state he was the 
pride, and most justly : he was an ornament of that of the nation. 

He was no case hunter. He placed little stress on authorities, unless 
unequivocally decisive. He grasped the governing principles, took a 
lucid view of his case, and in the application argued with overwhelming 
effect. 

He prepared himself with diligence and care ; examined and under- 
stood the matters that were to form the argument ; would touch nothing 
that could be turned against him. The writer, concerned with him in a 
case involving new and important points, had found an authority which 
he deemed pertinent and weighty. He went into an argument to show 
how clearly applicable were the principles involved in the decision, and 
how a position apparently contradictory not only was not so, but was 
corroborative of these principles. Mr. Bayard, after listening atten- 
tively, replied — " This is all very well ; it would be a pleasant exercise 
to a student thus to unfold and show the application of the principles ; 
but we have to do with judges, who, while we are reasoning to show 
that the general principles of the case are decisive, may run away with 
the position that carries on its face an opposite appearance. Never," 
said he, " cite a case that does not run on all four." He rejected the 
case, and gave the writer an impressive and useful lesson through the 
mode in which he treated it. 

Judge Hall made public profession of religion in 1827. Beginning 
late, he considered that special diligence was required. His attention 
was directed to youth, where there were no suitable means of training 
and education — their whole moral being in a forming state, and they de- 
pendent on others to be moulded with skilful care or marring neglect. 
Men inculcate upon their fellow-men obligations to be worthy citizens 
of a free government, moral virtues requisite to the comfort and safety 
of society, and the religious course which Revelation portrays and en- 
joins as emphatically the way of life. But the character of the men to 
whom these lessons are addressed is already settled — either to go for- 
ward in the prescribed way, and therefore the direction is superfluous, 
or to pursue a different track, and therefore it will not be heeded. The 
work to which all this points has been done, or is past doing — the pro- 
per time, the fit state, childhood and youth. Hence his labors in the 



WILLARD HALL, OF DELAWARE. 427 

cause of common schools have been unintermitted, and he has been a 
teacher in Sabbath schools from the date of his religious profession. 

A gospel minister, speaking of a classmate, said, that he had been 
under strong religious convictions, but he would not yield to them because 
he had determined to study law, and he considered that the practice of 
law could not be advantageously followed consistently with avowed 
religious character. The minister thought his classmate's view correct, 
and approved his candor. 

The reply of Judge Hall was : Of all men a lawyer should be a reli- 
gious man. He especially needs the guidance and power of religion — 
not because lawyers are more apt than any other profession, not except- 
ing the apparently most safe, to swerve from rectitude, (for this is not 
so : if the temptations are strong, so are the motives to pure, unbend- 
ing integrity,) but because no one can better manifest the graces of re- 
ligion, nor fulfil its duties. When we have completed a college course, and 
pursued our law studies for the regular period, and especially if in both 
we have been diligent, we are confidently sent out as prepared to enter 
upon a business life. But the most important element of preparation 
is wanting — acquaintance with God, knowledge of His government and 
laws, discovery of the source of all moral principle, of all hope to ani- 
mate and establish purpose, of all energy against discouragement, of the 
motives of all rational life, and familiarity with exercises to keep these 
attainments fresh, vigorous, and growing, as the germains of all useful- 
ness and enjoyment. 

It is admitted that religion is associated, in many minds, with imbe- 
cile cant, boastful self righteousness, gloomy or debasing superstition, 
blind, distempered zeal. But these are abuses of religion. Nothing 
so expands, elevates, and strengthens intellect, as religious observance, 
under the prayerful study of the Bible, to enlighten and invigorate con- 
science, and direct practically the life ; and nothing can be so exalting 
and enriching as tracing the hand of the Mighty Maker and Director iu 
common things or occurrences, the hidden, but abounding and wonder- 
ful recesses of nature, or the higher wonders of the celestial world, under 
the conviction, all these hath God wrought, in infinite wisdom and good- 
ness, for infinitely wise and good ends. And I am occupying niy place 
through His wisdom and goodness, working out His designs, and exist- 
ing, therefore, for their high and glorious consummation. 

It is with continually fresh and increasing admiration the well-read 
lawyer quotes Lord Mansfield's declaration — " The substantial rules of 
pleading are founded in strong sense and the soundest, closest logic; and 
so they appear when well understood and explained." For he has ex- 
perienced the truth in mental discipline and legal attainment. The 
pious lawyer, in the study of God's word and works, hearing His voice 
and seeing His hand, experiences higher discipline and attainment, finds 
stronger sense and sounder logic, abundantly "manifest when well 
understood and explained." The mind becomes conscious of inherent 
living power before unknown, and that power is constantly drawn out 
to profitable effect. 



i 



« 








L/^c/'^f^r iSiJOropfU.'OJ S^''^'Cr,'\<!- •">/* J'^r . 



DANIEL A. WILSON, OF VIRGINIA. 429 

HON. DANIEL A. WILSON, 

OF VIRGINIA. 

Daniel Allen Wilson was born in Cumberland county, Virginia, 
the 21st day of ^lay, 1790. His ancestors were among the early set- 
tlers of the state. His father, Richard Wilson, of James City, served 
in the Revolutionary War as an officer of the Virginia militia, and was 
engaged in the battle of Guilford and the siege of Yorktown, which ter- 
minated that ever-memorable struggle. His mother, Priscilla, was the 
daughter of Daniel Allen, of Cumberland. At an early age he entered 
Hampden Sydney College, at which celebrated seat of learning he ac- 
quired a high reputation for scholarship and honorable deportment. The 
manly and generous qualities that exhibited themselves in his inter- 
course with his fellows; the kindliness, sincerity, and independence of 
spirit that formed his social character, won for him, to an unusual de- 
gree, the esteem of those with whom he was associated ; while the faith- 
ful performance of his scholastic duties, and the facility with which he 
mastered his studies, attracted the regard of his teachers, and excited 
hopes of future distinction, not disappointed in the sequel of his life. 

After his academic studies were completed, he entered the law-office 
of William Daniel, subsequently one of the most eminent judges of the 
General Court of Virginia, under whose direction he prosecuted the 
study of the law. In 1810 he was admitted to the bar, and entered at 
once upon a lucrative practice. As a lawyer, he gained most reputa- 
tion as an advocate ; and was particularly distinguished for his success 
before juries in criminal cases. In all the duties of the practitioner — 
multiform, delicate, and trying as they are — his integrity was above 
reproach ; and his fairness, ability, and skill, commanded the confidence 
and admiration alike of his professional brethren and of the public. He 
was esteemed by all as a conscientious counselor, an eloquent advocate, 
and a learned and discriminating jurist. 

During the war of 1812 he performed two tours of service, as lieu- 
tenant of a volunteer troop of cavalry, from his native county ; and 
though the fortunes of war did not bring him into the presence of the 
enemy, the promptness with which the company rallied to the defence 
of the country, and the high degree of discipline and soldiery excellence 
attained by the Cumberland calvary, made it one of the most noted 
corps in the service. 

In 1814, having resumed the practice of his profession at Cumberland 
courthouse, he was united in marriage with Ann Rebecca, daughter of 
John Macon, of Powhatan. He continued the practice of the law with 
unvaried success and distinction until the year 1824. when, yielding to 
the solicitations of others, and lured, it may be, by political aspirations, 
he became a candidate for, and was elected to a seat in the General 
Assembly. From that period until 1828, when he declined being a 
candidate for re-election, he continued to represent his county in the 
House of Delegates without opposition. During the term of his ser- 
vice in this capacity, and afterwards, he was on terms of intimacy with 



430 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

Tazewell, Randolph, Giles, and other statesmen of Virginia of world- 
wide renown. This era of the legislative history of Virginia was mark- 
ed rather by an unusual amount of talent than by political excitement 
or agitation. The subject of this sketch was one of the leaders of that 
division claiming to adhere most rigidly to a strict construction of the 
Federal Constitution. He was chiefly instrumental in the election of 
Tazewell to the Senate of the United States ; and in the contest of 1826, 
between Randolph and Tyler for a seat in the same body, he exerted 
himself warmly in favor of the former. 

During the cessation of party strife that succeeded the election of 
Jefferson, and characterized the administrations of Madison and Mon- 
roe, and the early part of Adams', the legislature of Virginia was main- 
ly engaged in the consideration of questions of state policy. Wherever 
questions of a party character arose, and especially such as involved the 
rights of the states, Mr. Wilson was always found co-operating with 
those who demanded that the action of the federal government should 
be restricted to powers clearly granted by the constitution. He was a 
firm supporter of the doctrines of that school founded by Jefferson and 
Madison, and of the principles set forth in the celebrated resolutions of 
1798-'99. But during the political calm to which reference has been 
made, no question, of other than minor interest, involving federal poli- 
tics, arose. Among other subjects of state policy, a reformation in the 
judiciary system came under consideration. In imitation of the English 
practice, and without regard to the sparseness of the population, the 
common law and chancery jurisdiction were divided, and vested in 
separate tribunals. The common law jurisdiction was vested in Cir- 
cuit Courts, held by judges in each county of the state — while the 
chancery jurisdiction was vested in Courts of Chancery, held by chan- 
cellors for large districts — the whole state being divided into only five. 
This arrangement occasioned very great inconvenience to suitors, and 
sometimes led to a denial of justice. Not unfrequently the Courts of 
Law and those of Chancery differed as to their respective jurisdictions, 
and in some cases there was no mode of determining which was the 
rightful tribunal. But the chief inconvenience resulted from the size of 
the districts. Suitors were required to travel great distances, and re- 
main at great expense, awaiting the tedious action of lawyers and the 
court, and the dilatory movements of parties, whose interest it frequent- 
ly was to retard the decree of the chancellor. This attendance upon 
the courts was the more arduous from the want, at that time, of all 
facilities for travel, except the ordinary roads and conveyances. 

Experience of the evils of such a system prompted Mr. Wilson 
to undertake its reformation, and accordingly he moved a resolution of 
inquiry into the matter; and shortly afterwards, as chairman of the 
committee appointed for the purpose, reported a bill, blending the com- 
mon law and chancery jurisdictions, and conferring it jointly on the 
Circuit Superior Courts of each county in the state. The bill, through 
his influence, passed the House of Delegates, but was lost in the Senate. 
The scheme was, however, so favorably received by the people, that it 
was adopted a few sessions later, and yet remains almost the only fea- 
ture of the judicial system that has not since undergone a change. Its 



DANIEL A. WILSON, OF VIRGINIA. 431 

adaptation to the circumstances and wants of the people of Virginia has 
been tested and approved by the experience of twenty years. 

In 1829 Mr. Wilson was elected by the General Assembly one of 
the eight members of the Council of State. In 1830, the Council hav- 
ing been reduced by the amended Constitution, from eight to three, he 
was again chosen one of the three. The office of Council ur was, at 
this period, one of great responsibility and corresponding honor. By 
the organic law of the state, the Governor was directed, before he 
exercised any discretionary power conferred on him by the Constitution 
or laws, to require the written advice of the members of the Council. 
In the absence, or at the death or resignation of the Governor, the eldest 
Councilor acted as Governor of the state. The era of which we are 
speaking, is one of the most brilliant in the history of Virginia. Then 
Giles, Floyd and Tazewell stood at the helm of state. Randolph, of 
Roanoke, was in the zenith of his unequaled powers, and, with all his 
mental idiosyncracies. was the steadfiist advocate of state rights. Taze- 
well was the most accomplished and astute statesman and jurist of the 
age. Giles was possessed of a most vigorous and searching intellect, 
and was an ardent co-laborer with the others in support of the Virginia 
construction of the Federal Constitution. Peter V. Daniel, who now 
adorns the bench of the Federal Judiciary, was then prominent and in- 
fluential in controlling the policy of the state, and moulding the political 
sentiments of its people. These were the associates and friends of Mr. 
Wilson. With these kindred spirits, he assisted in directing the desti 
nies of the "Old Dominion" for a series of years, more glorious than 
any since the days o^ the Revolution. 

In 1840 Mr. Wilson, having again become a private citizen, was 
elected by the General Assembly one of the Judges of the General 
Court of Virginia. The oflii^e was conferred at the solicitation of many 
members of the legal profession in the circuit, with whom he had been 
long and intimately associated in the practice, and who possessed the 
amplest means of knowing his moral and mental qualifications for the 
high trust. Its- acceptance imposed no ordinary amount of duty and 
responsibility. The docket, with perhaps a single exception, was the 
largest in the state; and many of the cases involved interests of vast 
and extended moment. In the town of Lynchburg, and the county of 
Buckingham particularly — the one the most active and enterprising 
place of business for its number of inhabitants in the state, the other a 
large and populous county, in which unfortunate speculations had en- 
tailed a class of suits extraordinary in number and character — the diffi- 
culties of the post were most embarrassing. In Lynchburg, a heavy 
bank defalcation had involved the citizens and money institutions in 
prosecutions and litigation, that brought up the most intricate principles 
of criminal law, and the most delicate questions of commercial relation. 
In the discharge of these trying duties, the Judge'sfixed and unwearying 
purpose seemed to be, to arrive at the truth, and to administer the law. 
He displayed throughout the tedious process of the various trials, (what 
are indeed the striking characteristics df his judicial bearing,) patience, 
courtesy, dignity, and veneration for the laws, as they are written. 

In no other department of civil government do such important occa- 
sions sd^ frequently occur for the exercise of the rare and exalted endow- 



432 SKBTCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

ments of moral and mental excellence, firmness, decision and foresight, 
as the judiciary. The timely and efficient execution of the laws — the 
protection and preservation of the public and private rights of the citi- 
zen — the dispensation of impartial justice between excited parties — and 
the maintenance of the quiet dignity — the calm, temperate and com- 
placent manner — that will inspire confidence, respect and obedience — 
are some of the varied and momentous obligations which devolve on 
those to whom its administration is intrusted. The character of the 
iudge must, therefore, possess a well adjusted combination of the purest 
and noblest mental and moral elements. Unmoved by the impulses 
and frailties that seem the inseparable concomitants of humanity, he 
has daily to observe and to analyze their practical operations and effects 
in others ; impassive and emotionless — the chosen incarnation of the 
law — he delivers, expounds and administers its will and its judgment ; 
and, with truthful conceptions of the peculiar and complicated linea- 
ments of each case of litigation, he is prompt, when the palliation of 
circumstances dictates the course, to relax the ri^or of the law, and to 
give full and free expression to the mild, just and humane spirit from 
which it emanates, and for whose vindication and protection it ought 
alone to be enforced. 

Under the happy influences of our popular institutions, it may be said 
with striking propriety, that the usefulness and efficiency of the tribu- 
nals of the country are secured and enhanced in proportion to the con- 
fidence and respect with which they inspire the members of the com- 
munity. The cheerful obedience, which the good citizen acknowledges 
to be an indispensable duty he owes to the tribunals of the law, will 
become a sullen submission so soon as the dispenser of the law fails to 
display prominently, in the discharge of judicial duties, the essential 
attributes of the good and upright judge. No American can resist the 
temptation to indulge an excusable impulse of national pride, while re- 
flecting upon the widely different circumstances which, in this respect, 
attend the administration of the laws of theUnited States and of England. 
The judicial systems of the two countries, though springing from the 
same venerable source, and founded on the same great, unchanging 
principle, bring into requisition the appliances of their peculiar and con- 
genial agencies in order to inspire respect and to secure obedience. In 
England the law is administered by officers, who, elevated high above 
the people, alike ignorant of the social and moral composition and the 
interests of those whose private and public rights they adjudicate and 
determine, seek to make themselves respected only by the display of 
official insignia^ and to awe men into unworthy obsequiousness by their 
imperious manner ; they are sustained in authority and their decrees 
enforced by the constraining presence and vigilance of a powerful con- 
stabulary. Here the judge, selected from the body of the people, 
has the honorable distinction conferred upon him exclusively in con- 
sideration of the possession of the high qualifications requisite to the 
station; he will retain the manner to which a freeman may consistent- 
ly and honorably yield a cheerfol and ready obedience, and will endear 
himself and the tribunal over which he presides to the hearts of the 
people by the continual display of his ardent love of justice, his impar- 
tiality, firmness, independence, unvacillating judgment, and kintd, cour 



DANIEL A. WILSON, OF VIRGINIA. 433 

teous and dignified bearing. The strength, efficiency and moral influ- 
ence of a tribunal thus organized — appealing directly to the republican 
loyalty and devotion of the people — are inconceivable. It exerts a 
widely diffused, ennobling influence which elevates the sentiments of 
all to the standard of its own excellence. Parties freely submit their 
dearest rights to its arbitrament, confident that justice will be consult- 
ed and its unerring judgment rendered. The court becomes truly the 
temple of justice — the shrine of purity and of truth — and every citizen 
that crosses its consecrated threshold bows instinctively to the irresist- 
ible emotions of respect, obedience and veneration, which a sense of 
the presence of the embodiment of virtue, justice and exalted worth in- 
spires in the manly heart. 

Judge Wilson discharges the onerous duties and responsibilities of 
his office with an industry and ability which few of his distinguished 
compeers have attained. He is ardent and untiring in devotion to 
business — of inflexible sternness and independence — of sound, discrimi- 
nating and far-reaching judgment and sagacity — thoroughly imbued with 
the passion of the great masters of the profession — and familiar with all 
the useful and ornamental attainments of the accomplished jurist. He 
presents, in a remarkable degree, the rare combination of all the essen- 
tial qualifications for the position which he fills with so great honor to 
himself, and so much of usefulness and benefit to his native state. 

Judge Wilson forcibly illustrates, in his official bearing, the happy 
tendency of that conservative republicanism which pervades alike all 
the institutions of the country. Plain and unostentatious, his judicial 
manner harmonizes with the impressive simplicity of his characte . 
Generous, frank and cordial, no man approaches him insensible of tliL' 
genial inspirations of his presence. His temper is, at all times, even 
under circumstances of the most annoying and provoking nature, in 
perfect subjection to his will. Cool and dispassionate, he allays, by the 
silent influence of his example, the angry feelings and fierce passions 
which are so often momentarily engendered in the transaction of legal 
business; and the rude and wicked spirit that defies the physical appli- 
ances of the law's power, stands reproved, abashed, silent and res[)ect- 
ful in the serene and dignified presence of the virtuous judge. He is 
the type of the republican judge. 

The universal love, admiration and esteem in which he is held by the 
people of the circuit where he presides, evince their high appreciation of 
the public and private worth and excellence of his character, and is per- 
haps the most congenial, as it deserves to be the most enduring monu- 
ment of his matchless virtues. 

Notwithstanding the constant pressure of judicial duties. Judge Wil- 
son has not been insensible to the patriotic impulses of a true son of 
the " Old Dominion." He has been the sterling advocate of a liberal 
internal improvement policy. He felt that the vast commercial, manu- 
facturing and productive resources of Virginia were to be explored and 
developed, before she could hope to attain the pre-eminent place that 
nature seemed to have designed her to occupy; and this result could 
be accomplished alone by the prosecution of an extensive and judicious 
system of internal improvement, that would, in time, unlock her moun- 
tain fastnesses and expose their hidden treasures — afford the varied pro- 

28 



434 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

(Auctions of her fertile soil quick and cheap access to market — and reach 
out arras of iron to embrace the trade and traTcl of the populous cities 
and growing states of the rich and teeming valley of the Mississippi. 
Judge Wilson became the early friend of this policy, and has continued 
one of its staunchest and ablest advocates. When that link in the 
chain of the great southwestern improvement — the Virginia and Ten- 
nessee Rail-road — received its charter from the legislature of the 
state, in the newspapers and on the hustings he exerted all the 
energies of his vigorous mind and the fervor of his eloquence in its 
behalf. His heart glowed with a new life in anticipation of the re- 
generation of the old commonwealth. He looked to this mighty im- 
provement as an essential element in the consummation of this result ; 
and he felt a commensurate interest in its success. With the wise men 
of the state he foresaw that the connection of the capes of Virginia with 
the California seaboard, by a continuous railway, penetrating the heart 
of the richest mineral and agricultural regions of the state, and drain- 
ing the broad valley of the Mississippi, would speedily secure to Vir- 
ginia an increase of population, energy, wealth and prosperity of which 
even an approximate estimation would startle and astound the mind. 
The cycle of a few years will prove that his labors in this behalf have 
not been the least valuable of the services he has rendered to his native 
state, the memory of which will endear his name to her people, and ex- 
cite their profound and lasting gratitude* 




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ALFRED WHEELER, OF CALIFORNIA. 43 i 

HON. ALFRED WHEELER, 
of california. 

San Francisco, California, 

April, 1852. 



The statesmanship of a Webster, and the eloquence of a Clay ; the 
learning and wisdom of a Marshall, a Story, or a Kent — these would 
make pages of life for the philosopher to admire, and the student to 
emulate. Their greatness has been accomplished, and their histories 
have become immortal ; but men, who have as yet but begun to do, 
might prove weak guides and uninteresting examples to those who aim 
at greatness and have the genius to achieve it. 

Such as my life has been, I have concluded to send it to you ; and, as 
no one so well as ourselves can know the motives that guide us in our 
career, or which instigate the prominent incidents of our own histories, 
I have thought it better, for the sake of truth and frankness, to write it 
myself than to trust the task to a friend, whose prejudice might dimin- 
ish the faults and magnify the virtues. Should it seem to you, as it 
does to me, tame and uninteresting, consign it to the flames, and make 
light of it. 

I was bom in New-York city, on the 30th day of April, 1822. My 
father was, at that time, and for many years afterwards, a merchant of 
considerable business in New- York, and a descendant of one of the pil- 
grims of Plymouth Rock memory, and an officer in the war of 1812. 
My mother was the grand-daughter of John Suffem, Esq., of Rockland 
county, New- York, for many years first judge of that county. I have 
never traced out a pedigree of great and heroic ancestors, and I believe 
that the only nobility to which they could aspire was that of worth and 
honesty, and to have served their country during the days of '76. My 
parents had married for love — I was the eldest son, and, as they have 
told me, the one of whom they had much hope. I would probably 
have been, like most of eldest sons, a spoiled child, were it not that, 
fearing the unwholesome air of a city life might cut short my career 
and their hopes, they sent me down east, as soon as I could leave 
a nurse's charge, to receive the foundation of an education, and breathe 
the invigorating air of a country life. 

It is with the town of Greenwich, State of Connecticut, that my ear- 
liest associations and recollections are blended. The old school-house, 
where I first learned Latin from my teacher, and love from a little 
blue-eyed sweetheart ; the old church with a tall, straight spire, that 
seemed to me to scrape the sky ; the old hill, called *' Putnam's Hill," 
and down which General Putnam rode at full gallop, when the British 
soldiers chased him, and where I used to look, with boyish wonder, for 
some stray footprint of his horse's hoof; and the old house on top of 
the hill which stood there when he ran down, and which, they said, was 
a hundred years old, and in which I lived, while there at school, every 



43G SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

summer for six or seven years. These are the chief recollections of my 
boyhood, until I was brought home to New-York to prepare for college 
and for manhood. The earliest ambitions which I cherished were to be 
twenty-one years of age and a lawyer. The first, to my boyish mind, 
constituted a man, the second, a great man. 

My father aimed at giving me as good an education as money and 
care could bestow, and, being of strict religious principles and belief, 
hoped to direct my inclination to the church ; but the purpose and hope 
never found favor nor consent with me, as I did not feel fitted for the 
station, either in my heart or my head. I loved gayety and mirth, and 
was ambitious. 

At sixteen, I entered the freshman class of the New- York University. 
The books which I loved the most were rhetoric, oratory and the poets. 
I had a remarkable memory, and had exercised it from childhood. I 
could readily commit to memory whole pages, and could retain the re- 
collection as easily. 1 was quick of apprehension, and could, with half 
the study that many would require, accomplish the same task. Fun 
was my delight. I omitted no opportunity to let off sallies of wit to 
my professors, when it could be done with respect to them, and to excite 
the mirthfulness of the class. Being naturally ready with the pencil, I 
caricatured everything. The black-boards were filled with my illustra- 
tions, and the walls about the building had my pencil-mark upon them. 
I read volumes of poetry and scribbled pages of rhyme, and every text- 
book which I used had on every fly-leaf doggerel rhyme and improvise 
sketches. There was no portion of college routine in which I took so 
much interest as 1 did in that of oratory. On every Saturday represen- 
tatives from each class appeared in the chapel, before the faculty and 
students, to exercise and exhibit their oratorical powers. To this reci- 
tation 1 always looked forward with pleasure. The histories of the 
Greek and Roman orators, and no less those of modern times, were to 
me a delightful study. I read and committed to memory their best 
orations, and daily recited them to myself in my own room. 1 studied 
elocution, to the neglect of Greek and Latin, and thought that to be an 
orator was to be the greatest of men. 

I had not been long in the University before a great change took 
place in the pecuniary circumstances of my father. The reverses and 
convulsions of '36 swept from him a moderate fortune, which he had 
acquired by his own industry and talent, and he was compelled to aban- 
don a style of city life which had been elegant and independent, for one 
of strict economy in the country. Till this time he had lived in New- 
York city, but having a large family to educate and rear, he removed 
to a small village upon the Hudson, where my mother had a farm which 
she had inherited from her father. I had thus far lived at home. Now, 
if 1 remained at the University my expenses would be increased, and 
situated as my father was, he felt compelled to tell me that he could 
not afford to keep me at college. He proposed to me to go to the 
country with the rest of the family, and pursue the study of law in a coun- 
try lawyer's office there and board at home, or to enter a lawyer's office 
in New-York city as a clerk, and thus earn sufficient to pay my own 
expenses. This was at first a great blow to me and a damper to my 
hopes ; but I revolved the matter in my mind and came to the conclu- 



ALFRED WHEELER, OF CALIFORNIA, 437 

sion to adopt neither of his suggestions, but to remain at college, sup- 
port myself as I best could, and, if necessary, rough it out. I had never 
earned a dollar in my life and did not know how to go about it, but 1 
had the determination to persevere and the hope to succeed, and trusted 
to my ingenuity for assistance. 1 told my mother of my resolve, and 
she, with a mother's anxiety and affection, asked me what I should do 
for a livelihood, to which I replied, that others had found opportunities 
to make a living and I did not know why I could not; that 1 had some 
leisure hours which I could devote to labor of some kind, and that, at 
least, I was determined to try. She begged me to go with the 
family to the country, but I said no, and asked her to leave me such 
furniture as would be necessary to make a room in college comfortable, 
and to prepare for me a small stock of provisions, sufficient to supply 
me for a week or two, as I would not go to board until 1 had business 
that would enable me to pay my expenses, and meanwhile, would keep 
bachelor's hall. She accordingly stored a large two-bushel basket with 
all the good things that a mother would think of — a few cold roast 
chickens, a boiled ham, some pies, bread, butter, cheese, and not for- 
getting such delicacies as cake and sweetmeats — and with this hamper 
of things for the inner man and furniture for my room, a good stock of 
clothing and five dollars in my pocket, I parted with my family as they 
sailed away, and I started on my own career. 

I hired a room in the University building, paid one dollar out of my 
five for cartage of my goods and chattels to it, and having taken posses- 
sion, swept it out and arrayed my furniture, 1 spread a table and took 
a solitary meal. It was rather lonesome and depressing to my spirits 
at first, but I felt the pride of determination and independence, and 1 
thought of the future. My little stock of stores lasted me nearly a 
month, and I began to fearr that when they had gone 1 should be in a 
predicament — with but four dollars in my pocket, and too honest to in- 
cur a debt without the means of paying, too spirited to borrow, and too 
proud to tell a solitary friend of my situation. 

One day, as I sat before my fire, (it was only at meal-time that I in- 
dulged in the extravagance of a fire,) toasting a slice of ham upon a fork 
preparatory to my afternoon meal, a rap at the door started me from a 
reverie into which I had fallen while gazing upon the glowing coal and 
enjoying in anticipation the relish that appetite gives to food. I hastily 
hid within the pantry the evidence of my occupation, and taking a book 
in my hand, with the look of one absorbed in study, opened the door. 
My visitor was an early college friend and companion, who had often 
visited me at my father's house in town, and had eaten peaches and 
other delightful fruit from our beautiful garden, and knew nothing of 
the change that had happened to me. " Wheeler," said he, as he en- 
tered, " what an intolerable smell of cooking there is of late about this 
building. I fancy our janitor must have brought his kitchen into the 
college." " I have noticed it," said I in reply. " Perhaps some one of 
our professors is about to give us a lecture with practical illustrations 
in the art of cuisine. I am sure I should take great interest in it." He 
remained but a few moments and left without discovering the secret 
that I would not have had him know for a thousand dollars. 

As the pfovisions grew less, so I made my appetite conform, but at 



438 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

last they were all gone, and the few dollars I had were resorted to. 
After dark I used to take a little basket in my hand and go to the near- 
est grocery and purchase a loaf of bread, some slices of bacon or dried 
beef, a few crackers with some cheese, and with this simple fare keep 
body and soul together, feeding upon hope to make up what I lacked in 
provisions. During this little period of darkness, I lived for one week 
upon less than fifty cents, indulging in no luxury other than bread for 
that period, and eating this with a relish that I had never enjoyed be- 
fore. The secret of my life was my own. I told it to no one; and my 
replies to my mother's fond inquiries of how I was getting along, were, 
that I was accomplishing my purpose. I daily read all through the ad- 
vertisements in the papers in search of some want which my capacity 
could fill during such hours of the day as I was not occupied at the uni- 
versity. I found none to my purpose; but just as my scanty purse was 
empty, I was so fortunate as to get employment with the pencil, for the 
afternoon hours, in the office of an architect in town, who had been an 
old acquaintance of my father, and who, during ray father's prosperity, 
had received his patronage. My pay was small, but so were my wants, 
and I was content to get just enough compensation to support me with 
economy. I remained in his employ until I graduated ; each day after 
the recitations were through, plodding my way to his office, and passing 
the time till dark in architectural drawing. 

Situated as I was, I could not and did not take any of the honors of 
our class when we graduated. Oftentimes, on the commencement of a 
new text-book. I was for weeks without a book for want of means to 
buy it, and my only time and opportunity for study was an hour before 
recitation in the morning, when the library was open. But I had a 
satisfaction which no one could take from me. 1 was battling out my 
purpose and succeeded ; and when I took my degree, ?io one knew how 
hard I had worked and how much I had suffered to earn it. 

After graduating I found an opportunity, by teaching a class in Latin 
and mathematics and drawing, in a select school, to earn better compen- 
sation than before ; and in this manner supporting myself, while I pur- 
sued my legal studies in the office of an eminent practitioner in New- 
York city, until, at the May term of 1845, 1 was admitted to the Supreme 
Court of the state. 

I threw myself at once upon my profession, abandoning all other 
labors, although, during the last year of my law studies,! had earned six 
hundred dollars by teaching, and could not expect to do so well at once 
in my profession. But I had gained the lever with which I was to work 
in future, and I determined to use it at once. 

The first year's labor brought me four hundred dollars ; the next seven 
hundred and fifty ; the next twelve hundred, and the next two thousand. 
This brought me to the May of 1849. During my law studies, and 
during these four years of my practice in New-York city, I had entered 
somewhat into political life. 1 had always, from my first investigation 
of the political questions at issue in the country, chosen the whig school 
as the faith of my adoption, and I felt, when I had made my first politi- 
cal speech, which was for " Tippecanoe and Tyler too,''^ as though I had 
taken the first step on the ladder of fame, and might ascend. 

The excitement that pervaded every part of the country on the dis 



ALFRED WHEELER, OF CALIFORNIA. 439 

covery of gold in California did not at first interest my mind nor direct 
my aspirations towards this region. I was making money and friends. 
I was happy, and surrounded with congenial objects. Those too whom 
I loved were there, and the thought of severing all these ties at first 
never entered my mind. But as the tide of emigration swelled onward 
from the shores of the Atlantic to the Pacific, and as friend after friend, 
taking his departure for this El Dorado, came to bid me good-by, I be- 
gan to look at the subject with more careful calculation. I saw in the 
future a great state that should rival, during the present generation, her 
most prosperous sister states. 

I saw that the silent solitude of the Pacific Ocean was to be at last 
broken by the genius of American enterprise, and that its commer- 
cial wealth was to pour through this golden gate a tide of treasure 
as precious as the gold that was tempting half the country to emigra- 
tion. I saw that there was a future for California that no man could 
picture, and that to grow with her growing and to be prosperous with 
her prosperity, to become identified with her interests, and to be a 
part of herself, was worthy of my ambition. 1 saw around me at home 
men of genius and ambition who had toiled for years struggling against 
ill-fortune, and who, though worthy, had yet come no nearer to wealth 
or renown. 

The field at home was wide and splendid, but the aspirants and con- 
testants for position were many, and the race for fame and pre-eminence 
was to be against those skilful and experienced, and there was but little 
chance for advancement save by the slow and steady perseverance of 
years of toil. I had already begun to acquire some little fame. I had 
scribbled rhyme and prose for the journals of the day, and was known 
somewhat as apoetandamanof literary taste, but Parnassus was not the 
hill to which I aspired. I had, too, for sundry political speeches, been puff- 
ed in the newspapers, and on several occasions had received the praise 
of professional brethren, and the congratulations of clients for efforts at 
the bar. I was making money besides, but I was restless at the tardi- 
ness with which fame and wealth were to be won, and so I resolved, in the 
face of expostulations and warnings of friends, to emigrate to California. 

Packing up a select law library of about a hundred volumes, I took 
passage, and on the 19th of May, 18-49, sailed, via Cape Horn. 

I landed at San Francisco on the 13th day of November following, 
the day of the adoption of the constitution of the new state, and had the 
gratification of depositing my vote in its favor as the first act of my citi- 
zenship here. Having taken breath, after a long and tedious sea voyage, 
I looked about to fiimiliarize myself with the anomalous condition of 
affairs. Business was done without care and without system, and money- 
flowed about from hand to hand as though it had no value. " Oo it 
blind'" was the maxim that ruled. Buy to-day and sell to-morrow — 
anything, no matter what; real estate or merchandise — everything was 
in demand. Gold-dust was the currency, and everybody had his pocket 
full. I was amazed, and so was each new-comer. The condition of af- 
fairs was indescribable. One fact was apparent — industry was here the 
mother of wealth; and as to fame, nobody thought of it. It was an 
empty bubble which, though you might buy, you could not sell, and was 
not worth keeping. 



440 SKETCHKS OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

As to the courts, there were two, one called the Court of First Instance, 
and the other the Alcalde's — names preserved from the former dis- 
pensation under Mexican rule. These ran a sort of opposition business, 
each claiming to be superior to, and independent of the other. About 
a dozen lawyers, all young men, and most of them shrewd and intelli- 
gent, practised before the courts. Every system of practice prevailed, 
and every kind of jurisprudence known to the common or the civil law, 
and much which would have been found in neither, was in force ; and 
the great and ruling doctrine seemed to be that the plaintiff must be en- 
titled to his case, or he would not have brought suit. The pay of the 
judges was in the shape of fees ; and on the rostrum of the judge, where the 
scales of justice should have been, the scales for gold-dust were in sight. 
Of course, business was dispatched with alacrity. Summing up a case 
to the jury was not to be permitted except in extraordinary circum- 
stances. The jury having heard the evidence, were presumed to know 
just as much about the case as the counsel, and were not permitted to 
be mystified by any legal sophistry ; besides, the docket was growing 
in length hourly. Counsel fees were of that extraordinary amount 
which would have been horrible to clients anywhere else. Forty-eight 
pounds of gold-dust an acquaintance told me he paid to one lawyer for 
only a few days' services in a single matter. 

But all these things have been now a hundred times repeated, and are 
familiar matters of history. 

1 looked at my purse, and found that my outfit and expenses had re- 
duced it to about five hundred dollars. An office, not much larger than 
a good-sized packing-box, demanded two hundred and fifty dollars a 
month rent in advance. Board was for forty dollars a week, and furni- 
ture higher than anything else. I looked about for a partner in busi- 
ness and in expenses, not daring to venture on such a sea of outlay alone. 
I found one who, like myself, had just arrived, with a small library and 
a small purse, and who had, like myself, large hopes and great deter- 
minations. We agreed to try the field together. "We hired an office, 
bought a couple of chairs, (more were unnecessary, as clients had no 
time to sit down,) and, finding that a common table would cost from 
fifty to a hundred dollars, we bought a pine board for fifteen dollars, 
and, with hammer and saw and our own ingenuity, made a table for our- 
selves. The next day our shingles, with golden letters, brought all the 
way from home, where they had not done us a great deal of service, 
were most invitingly and conspicuously nailed upon the outside of the 
building. A week passed away, and we had made a thousand dollars. 
We felt that our star had begun to shine, and that we might breathe 
freely when looking at the future. Party politics at this time were at a 
low ebb, though the democratic party had got the start, and had filled 
all the offices that were to be filled with men from their own ranks. 
Those of us who felt an interest in the whig party saw that, to guard the 
future, we must look out for the present. We met, and organized a 
whig committee as a nucleus for the gathering of whig forces in time of 
need. After I had been here six weeks making money and acquain 
tances, a vacancy occurred in the house of assembly of the state legisla- 
ture. An election, to fill the vacancy, was called, and the prominent 
whigs of the city proposed that I should accept the nomination of the 



ALFRED 'WHEELER, OF CALIFORNIA, 441 

party. It is no vanity to say that I reluctantly consented. 1 was mak- 
ing too much money to go to the legislature for sixteen dollars a day. 
However, it was agreed upon, and my name was put in the field as the 
whig candidate, and Mr. O'Grady as the democratic. His name de- 
feated him, and 1 was, as they said, triumphantly elected. 

I took my seat, and became an active and I hope useful member. 
After the adjournment I returned to my professional duties, and was 
soon after appointed, by the council of the city of San Francisco, com- 
missioner to investigate the tenure by which real estate within the city 
was held, and the title of the city to land within its limits. I was en- 
gaged for some months on this matter, and took great pains to make a 
report which should become, as it has, a standard-book of reference with 
every real-estate lawyer in the city. For these services the city paid me 
ten thousand dollars, though, considering the labor performed, and the 
prices of professional labor, they were in reality worth more. 

Fortune favored me with prosperity and her most substantial favors. 

On the 22d of August last, I had the honor to be appointed, by his Ex- 
cellency Millard Fillmore, United States Attorney for the Southern 
District of California. The death of James M. Jones, United States 
Judge for the same district, and the non-appointment of any new incum- 
bent, has prevented the organization of that court, and 1 have not been 
able, therefore, to enter upon ray official duties. I hope, however, soon 
to do so, and shall, in my career there, aim to tread that path which my 
early hopes pictured, and to wnich all my aspirations in life have been 
directed. 

You will see that in this brief biography there is no brilliant achieve- 
ment that can call forth admiration — there is no remarkable career that 
might not have happened to every reader. I claim no genius that is not 
common to all men. I started in life with a purpose, and the determi- 
nation to achieve it. If I have been blessed with fortune's substantial 
tokens and sorfle worldly honors, perseverance and industry are the only 
talismanic charms that 1 have used. 

I am, very respectfully, yours, 

Alfred Wheeler. 




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DANIEL 8. PEINTtTP, OF GEORGIA. 443 

COLONEL DANIEL S. PRLNTUP, 

V OF ROME, GEORGIA, 

Was born January 22d, 1823, in Montgomery county, New- York, 
His father was of English descent ; his mother's parents emigrated from 
Holland. Colonel Printup's early education was very limited, but, 
like many men who have risen to eminence in the legal profession in 
this country, this defect in his education only served to call forth the 
energies of his mind. A common school in his native county furnished 
him with the elements of an education, and at the early age of fourteen 
he left the paternal roof, and, with a sorrowful heart, turned his face to 
the cold, calculating world. For the space of two years he engaged in 
various pursuits, which not only afforded him a subsistence, but- en- 
abled him to devote three months of his time to study, which short 
period was spent at a select school in the village of Eultonville, New- 
York. Much benefited by the knowledge he obtained, gladly would 
he have prolonged his stay, but the want of means prevented him at 
this time. He left this school with the intention of going to New- 
York, which he soon reached, and soon procured a situation as clerk in 
a mercantile house. Not relishing this sort of life, he determined to 
relinquish it; and, accordingly, in the month of September, 1839, he 
sailed for the " sunny south," and arrived in Georgia. Here, contrary 
to his inclination, he was induced to accept of a situatiion similar to that 
he had so lately and so heartily relinquished, yet still looking forward 
to a brighter day, when he might be enabled to complete his education. 
While here, he saved his salary with such scrupulous care that, at the 
end of two years, he had a sufficient sum to warrant him in pursuing his 
studies. Accordingly, February, 1842, he entered an academy in 
Paulding county, Georgia. The principal of this institution was a sound 
scholar and excellent teacher. He soon perceived that his pupil was a 
youth of more than ordinary capacity, with an ardent thirst for know- 
ledge, consequently he afforded him every facility in his power. The 
student applied all his energies, and with such unparalleled success, that 
ill the short period of nine months he was, in the opinion of his pre- 
ceptor, sufficiently prepared for admission to college. The legal pro- 
fession he had always liked, and at this time made up his mind to 
qualify himself for the bar, if possible, his limited means appearing the 
only barrier; he however received such assurancesof assistance from his 
brother, Joseph J. Printup, as to induce him to make the necessary 
arrangements for entering college. This he accomplished ; and in the 
month of April, 1843, entered in advance Union College, Schenectady, 
New-York, furnished by his excellent teacher, Benjamin T. Mosley, 
Esq., with a letter of recommendation to the president of that institu- 
tion — a part of which letter we here transcribe. Mr. Mosley says: "I take 
pleasure in recommending to your friendly regards a young gentleman, 
who possesses talents of a high order, to the cultivation of which 
(though neglected in early youth) he is most ardently devoted. He 
comes to seek from your institution that preparation which will 
best qualify him for the profession of law." During his collegiate 



444 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

course he sedalously husbanded every hour, (after preparing his recitations 
and attending his classes,) and devoted himself to his legal studies. His 
college-life was emphatically one of labor, but the youth was now the 
man, and throughout the three )ears of college-course he ranked among 
the first in his class. An incident occurred at the commencement of 
the second term of the " senior year," which serves to show the position 
he occupied in the esteem of his class-mates. This was his election to 
the office of class-marshal by his fellow-students, notwithstanding he was 
opposed by a young gentleman, the son of one of the first men in the 
United States. Subsequently he was also elected a member of the Phi 
Beta Kappa Society, and we would state that this honor is only confer- 
red on persons of the highest standing for scholarship. Having gradu- 
ated in 1846, he returned to Georgia, and was admitted to the bar ot 
that state in April of the following year ; his practice soon became 
respectable, and at the present time it is quite lucrative. Connected 
with his legal practice, he has held for years the office of agent for the 
principal bank of the State of South Carolina. His present residence 
is Rome, Georgia. 

Col. Printup in stature is at least six feet, and of rather slender form 
for one so high ; his appearance is that of a great student ; he is thoughts 
ful and grave, but very pleasant in conversation. We predict for him, 
if he lives, a bright career and an unenviable fame ; and as a lawyer 
and high-toned gentleman, he richly deserves it. 



I 




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ANDREW M. JANUARY, OF KENTUCKY. 445 

HON. ANDREW M. JANUARY, 

PRESIDENT OF THE MAYSVILLE BRANCH OF THE BANK OF KENTUCKY. 

The department of biography is crowded with the lives of men dis- 
tinguished in war, politics, science, literature and the professions. All 
the embellishments of rhetoric and the imagination have been essayed 
to captivate, stimulate and direct into these " upper walks of life," as 
they are entitled, the youthful mind and ambition of the country. Not 
content to make the academies and higher educational institutions hot- 
beds and nurseries to germinate and train aspirations for fame, military 
and civic, the most brilliant achievements in the field, the forum, the hall, 
and at the bar, of the great men of the past and present, have been ex- 
hibited in colors warm and glowing, to charm and inspire. Example 
has been added to precept ; the teachings of the lecture-room have been 
enforced by illustrations from real life, and the chaplet of glory and re- 
nown has been held up as the great and only prize. 

The result of this system is manifest, and by no means fortunate. 
The ranks of the professions are filled and overflowing. Pettifoggers, 
quacks, pedants, demagogues and militia ofl^cers are manufactured by 
wholesale. Thousands of young men of respectable abilities, entirely 
capable of achieving competence and character in the useful and more 
unpretending employments, are annually allured into professions for 
which they are entirely unsuited, and in which they can never succeed. 
Disappointment and idleness, or charlatanry and vice, are unfortunately 
the too frequent results, instead of thrift, independence and respectabili- 
ty flowing from wiser counsels. 

To instill into the minds and hearts of the young respect for great 
attainments, reverence for great virtues, and to excite the generous 
omuhition, by holding up, as examples for admiration and imitation, the 
lives of the wise, and great, and good, is commendable and right. But 
the field of example should be extended, and lessons on industry, ener 
g_v, usefulness, virtue, honor, the true aims of life and the true sources 
of happiness, should be gathered and enforced from all the various pro- 
vinces of human labor however humble. Our country is eminently in 
need of increased intelligence in commerce, agriculture and mechanism. 

Tiiose great divisions of labor should be rendered not only lucrative 
and respectable, as they are but honorable and attractive to the young 
in all classes of society. The lives of eminent merchants, formers, 
manufacturers, mechanics — of all who by honest labor have achieved 
distinguished success in the different occupations, should be written and 
commended to the young men of the republic. The path of labor and 
usefulness should be indicated as the highway to honor. 

In this view we have selected the subject of this sketch; a man of 
humble but honest parentage, born at the pioneer period in the history 
of Kentucky, reared in the forests, w^ith a slight elementary education, 
and no accomplishment but his trade ; who, by the force of high purpose 
and invincible resolution, industry, energy, enterprise, and a bold 
and vigorous mind and an honest heart, has not only achieved inde- 



446 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

pendence, but won a name for sagacity, public spirit, punctuality and 
probity amongst the foremost and most distinguished men of business 
in the west. 

Andrew M. January was born 3d August, 1794, in Jessamine coun- 
ty, Kentucky, about 12 miles from the city of Lexington. His father, 
Ephraim January, who was born in Pennsylvania, was the grandson of 
a French Huguenot. The persecution which drove the emigrant from 
his native land confiscated his estate, which was said to be very large. 
Ephraim January married Sarah McConnell, near McConnellstown, 
Pennsylvania, whilst they were both very young. In 1780, they emi- 
grated to Kentucky, and passing down the Ohio River, with several 
other families, in small flatboats fitted up to resist the attacks of In- 
dians, landed safely at Louisville in the spring. They took their little 
property to a fort called Spring Station, six miles from Louisville, and 
remained there six months. They then removed to the fort at Har- 
rodsburg, Kentucky, where they lived twelve months ; they afterwards 
went to the fort at Lexington, and remained there till the fall of 1783. 
Such was the unsettled condition of the country at that period, and the 
character of the savage warfare waged by the Indians, that a family was 
only safe when inside of a fortification. Andrew McConnell, the grand- 
father of A. M. January, and from whom he was named, was killed at 
the battle of the Blue Licks, which occurred in the summer of 1782. 
Although that battle resulted disastrously, additional forces pressed 
upon the Indians and drove them out of Kentucky, and an increase of emi- 
gration in the course of a year so checked the incursions of the Indians, 
that families were justified in making locations of their own in the neigh- 
borhood of Lexington and some other parts of the territory. Ephraim 
January accordingly obtained a pre-emption right to 1000 acres of land 
in the county of Jessamine, built a small log cabin on it in the midst 
of the forest, and moved his family, consisting of his wife and two young 
children, into it in 1783. His nearest neighbor was six miles distant. 
There he raised a family of eleven children — five sons and six daughters 
— and there the father and the mother lived and died — he, in 1823, in 
the 64th year of his age; she, in 1850, in her 87th year. They were 
both persons of ardent piety, belonging to the Associate Reformed, a 
branch of the Presbyterian Church, and gave great care to the religious 
training of their children. The family was large, and the father unable 
to provide capital to set up his sons in business. They all remained at 
home and worked on the farm until they were 17 or 18 years old. 
Each was then suffered to select some mechanical branch of business. 

in 1812, Andrew became an apprentice to the silver-plating business 
in Lexington, Ky., and served in that capacity three years and a-half 
Being a high-spirited boy, and feeling that his father was unable to fur- 
nish him with any other than the plainest clothing, he applied himself 
assiduously to the business and interests of his employer, and soon 
gained his confidence and good-will. He was allowed to do over-work, 
for which he received full price, and often worked as late as 12 o'clock at 
night. He was soon enabled to make one dollar per day for over-work. 
and thus to present a reputable appearance in society during his ap 
prenticeship. He found his early religious training of great service to 
him at this period. He was beset by temptations from many quar- 



ANDREW M. JANUARY, OF KBNTOCKT. 



447 



ters, but steadily resisted them. He had promised his mother, on leav- 
ing home, that he would avoid all evil company and the vices of the 
town, and he did so. Young and inexperienced as he was, possessing 
only the common English education of that day, obtained mostly in 
the winter season, and during rainy days, when work could not be done 
on the farm, he nevertheless determined to overcome all obstacles he 
might encounter, fix his mark high, and force his way upward to fortune 
and honor. 

In the spring of 1816, he commenced business' on his own account, 
in Lexington, and in the ensuing winter married Sarah Huston, daughter 
of William Huston, an old and highly esteemed resident of that place. 
He continued business there until the spring of 1818. It had promised 
well at first, but the country, shortly after peace was declared between 
the United States and Great Britain, became flooded with goods and 
manufactured articles. The silver-plating business suffered with others 
to such an extent that ware could be bought in the stores for less money, 
in many instances, than the cost at home of the rough material. 

Mr. January soon found that the time spent in qualifying himself for 
his business, had been to a great extent lost ; to pursue it was useless ; 
and with that promptness and decision which have ever marked his career, 
he determined to abandon it. Maysville, a town in northern Kentucky, 
on the Ohio river, was then as it has been since, the great point of ship- 
ment and distribution of the productions and merchandise of that por- 
tion of the state. In the summer of 1818, he removed to that place 
and opened a small grocery ; and in October of that year he purchased 
an interest in a commission house conducted by his uncle. In the 
spring of 1819, he bought the entire interest of the concern, and his 
uncle retired from the house. This was a bold step, as he had but 
slight experience and very limited means. He purchased on stipulated 
payments of one, two and three years. Few persons under such cir- 
cumstances would have undertaken such a responsibility ; but he had 
rare industry, energy and resolution, and a self-sustaining confidence 
in his own abilities. Every payment, as it fell due, was promptly met. 
He soon found that, by close application to the interests of his cus- 
tomers, his business was increasing from year to year. After paying 
for his establishment, he had in a short period accumulated quite a 
handsome sum, and was in a full tide of prosperity, when the whole 
was suddenly swept from him by the instrumentality of an individual 
in whom he had unfortunately confided, and he found himself involved 
to the amount of $3,000. This heavy reverse did not dishearten him ; 
he met it courageously, and determined to retrieve his losses. He 
continued his business, retained his customers, sustained his credit, and 
in one year realized enough to pay off all demands. His business con- 
tinued to improve and enlarge under his close application and judicious 
management 

Maysville, at that time, contained a population of only 1,200 or 
1,500 inhabitants; but few of the streets were paved, there was no 
paved road to the river, and the landing was bad. All the roads to the 
interior were rough ; poor even in the summer, almost impassable in 
the winter and spring. He therefore turned his attention to the subject 
of internal improvements, and in a few years, with the assistance of 



448 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMKRICANS. 

Other enterprising citizens, he succeeded in having all the streets paved, 
and good roads made to the river. In 1828, when there were not 
twenty miles of turnpike road in the state, a charter was procured from 
the legislature for a turnpike road from Maysville to Washington, a 
town four miles from the river in the direction of Lexington. The 
stock was soon subscribed, and the road put under contract. In the 
summer of that year, being sanguine that the road could be extended a 
distance of sixty miles to Lexington, he mounted his horse, and in com- 
pany with an enginefer, explored the intervening country, and raised a 
subscription along the line to pay the expenses of a survey. When at 
Lexington, he issued a card for a public meeting, had a conference with 
Hon. Henry Clay, enlisted him in the enterprise, and induced him to 
address the meeting in its behalf The meeting was successful ; public 
attention was excited, and means to defray the expenses of the neces- 
sary surveys secured. The next winter a charter was obtained extend 
ing the road from Washington to Lexington. As this road subse- 
quently became famous in national politics, a short history of the 
efforts and means by which it was completed will be pardoned. 

At that time but few persons in Kentucky had ever seen a turnpike, 
still fewer appreciated the benefits such an improvement could confer. 
Very few believed such a work practicable; the cost was considered 
beyond the resources of the country. The state, up to that time, had 
contributed nothing to the cause of internal improvements. It was-an 
enterprise of great boldness, and required great energy, perseverance 
and firmness. Upon the petition of the company to the legislature, a law 
was passed authorizing a subscription of $25,000 on behalf of the state 
so soon as $50,000 should be subscribed by individuals. By great ex- 
ertions on the part of the directors of the road, of which Mr. 
January was one, the requisite amount of $50,000 was obtained from 
individuals, and the sum of $75,000 thus secured. The road was im- 
mediately put under contract to the extent of that sum ; and at a suc- 
ceeding session, the legislature was induced to subscribe $50,000 more 
upon the condition that individuals should raise an additional $75,000. 
This was done in a few months by extraordinary efforts, and the $125,- 
000 secured. It required $200,000 more to complete the road; and as 
it would be used by the United States government for the transporta^ 
tion of the great eastern and western mails, the directory determined to 
petition Congress for aid to the amount of $150,000. The petition was 
favorably received, and a bill was passed appropriating that sum. The 
country recollects the fate of that measure. President Jackson struck 
it down with his veto, and left the enterprising company to their own 
resources. They resolved to carry the work forward. The directory 
negotiated loans upon their individual responsibility, and issued the 
scrip of the company to the amount of S70,000. The whole road 
was put under contract, and the legislature appealed to fur further aid. 
It was granted by a subscription of stock equal to that of individuals ; 
and in four years the road was completed at a cost of $426,000, being 
the first good McAdamized road in the United States, and the pioneer 
work of internal improvement in the State of Kentucky. This import- 
ant enterprise, commenced and completed mainly by the public spirit 
and perseverance of four or five citizens of Maysville, including A. M. 
January, gave a powerful impetus to the whole system of internal im- 



AKDRKW M. JANUARY, OF KKNTUCKT. 449 

provements in the state ; and is still the best work of the kind proba- 
bly in the United States. That road completed, Mr. January engaged 
heartily in the construction of two or three other turnpike roads 
leading into the interior, and at the same time conducted with 
great and increasing success an extensive commission business. His 
habits of business were then, and still are, of the most systematic and 
laborious character. He neglects nothing; he attends punctually to 
everything. His correspondence has always been conducted chiefly 
by himself, and has been so heavy and extensive, as for many months 
during the year to occupy his time until twelve and one o'clock 
at night. Situated at a way-port between Pittsburgh and Cincinnati, 
where boats stopped at all hours of the night to deliver and receive 
freight, his life was for many years one of great hardship, trial and ex- 
posure. His whole life has been spent in constant activity, and faith- 
ful and energetic attention to business. He has been successful, and 
has deserved success. He is now fifty-eight years of age, and 
although his constitution has been much broken by exposure and over- 
work, he is still a man of great labor and unrelaxing energy. 

Upon the location of a branch of the Bank of Kentucky at Maysville, 
in 1835, he was appointed its president, which post he fills at the present 
time. He is also president of the Maysville and Lexington Turnpike 
Road Company, having been connected with that road from its com- 
mencement in 1828. He is also a member of the board of directors 
of the Maysville and Lexington Rail-road Company; and no enterprise 
of a public nature has ever been undertaken in Maysville for the last 
thirty-four years, in which he has not taken a prominent and zealous 
part. And yet he has never sought any office, declining many indeed 
that have been offered. He throws his whole energies into whatever 
he undertakes, and success is almost certain to attend his efforts. His 
motto through life has been — " Whatever is worth doing, should be well 
done." 

Mr. January, many years since, attached himself, along with his wife, 
to the Presbyterian church. His walk and conversation as a Christian 
have been uniformly consistent and exemplary. His benefactions to 
the church have been constant and liberal — for the support of his own 
particular church, for the erection of churches, and the support of the 
gospel at home and abroad. His purse is ever generously open to 
every object of real benevolence or charity. 

In his intercourse with his fellow-citizens of all classes, Mr. January 
is frank and direct, but kind and courteous. Perfectly simple and unos- ^ 
tentatious in all his habits; unbounded in his hospitality ; warm, con- 
fiding and firm in his friendship; sagacious and independent in thought ; 
prompt, practical and vigorous in action ; punctual in all his engage- 
meHts ; modest and unassuming, yet courageous and dignified, he bears 
about him every mark of the gentleman and the man of business ; and 
presents as fair a model as can be found for the encouragement and 
imitation of the youth of the West who have friends, fame and fortune 
yet to win. 

29 




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H. H. EMMONS, OF MICHIGAN. * 451 



H. H. EMMONS 



OF DETROIT, MICHIGAN. 

When Mr. E. submitted to the writer of this the propriety of com- 
plying with the request to furnish a memoir for the present work, he 
remarlied, that " if the intention of the work was, at this day, to present 
to the profession a portraiture of the great leading lawyers of the nation, 
who thus far had most materially aided in laying the foundations of her 
jurisprudence, and constructing the framework of her constitution — those 
of whom the country was justly proud, and whose lives the American 
citizen would delight to hear read, criticised, and contrasted with 
the sages of the law in foreign lands — if such is the high object of the 
work, then," said he, " my own short, obscure, and wholly common-place 
history, has no business there. Its insertion would be absurd, and but a 
distasteful repetition, in another department, of those farcical exposures 
of littleness and vanity which so many inconsiderable men of modern 
times are making in the political reviews. Since the days of old iEsop 
the asses have never worn with success the skin of the lion. I have not 
yet begun to hope that, if Providence shall spare my life for thirty years 
to come, and suffer me still to toil on in the laborious path I have so sa- 
tisfactorily thus far followed, that I shall even then have been enabled 
so to keep up with the enlightening and growing spirit of modern juris- 
prudence, so to aid in improving its principles, in ameliorating the modes 
of its administration, and in leading the long list of able men which my 
state opposes to the efforts of any man who would lay claim to the first 
high station at its bar, as to place my name in a similar volume which 
shall, at that distant day, record the greatness of the American bar. 
There is no doubt whatever of the distinction between a ' distinguished • 
America?i laioyer,^ and a young, faithful, rising, successful leader of the 
bar in the newer states of the northwest. 

" As yet, we have few — indeed, no old, experienced, and profoundly 
learned lawyers. Our greatest boast must now be that our young men 
are as laborious and faithful, present as strong an array of talent and in- 
dustry, and, therefore, as many of the elements o{ future greatness, as the 
more aged and experienced bars of the East. Our time has not come to 
claim a place in a work which details the successes and glories, the great- 
ness and power, of the American judiciary, and its most learned and able 
counsellors. 

" But if the work proposes to furnish to the student and young pro- 
fessional man a guide and stimulus to exertion, by detailing the successes 
of living men, thus enabling them to see the precise road which others, 
succeeding at the same period, and in all respects circumstanced like them- 
selves, have followed up to wealth, high respectability in life, and eminent 
professional standing, then our own state may well furnish her quota of 
illustrations. Some of these results, in a slight degree, my own short 
history may illustrate ; and if the policy is to set forth instances of pro- 
fessional prosperity from each state, then I have no objection to have pre- 
pared the simple detail of my hard, unremitted twelve years' toil, its 



452 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

professional rewards, and quite moderate triumphs. If those who are 
starting on behind nie can see aught in it worthy of imitation, or tend- 
ing to stimulate a just professional ambition, I shall, indeed, be happy 
to know that thus early in life a far higher and better use of my labors 
can be made than 1 had ever dared to hope." 

The great mass of history writers have treated the acts of the politi- 
cian, the place-holder, and the military leader, as though they alone 
guided the destiny of their country, and moved on the wheels of civiliza- 
tion, and of social and intellectual progress. They overlook the mighty 
impulses, the revolutions and great principles, which the quiet and 
noiseless philosopher and the moral reformer are ever producing in the 
world. The men who enact into laws the profound principles which the 
historically imknown lawyer has eloquently demonstrated at the bar, 
and which the judge has elaborated, matured, and announced from the 
bench, alone find a place on the records of their time. They who are but in- 
struments, who but float along on the popular tide, and utter the thoughts 
and mature convictions which studious and unostentatious intellectual 
greatness has impressed on its country and age, alone figure in the columns 
of the political journal, and find a place on the historical page, while the 
real sources of human progress are unrecorded and unknown. 

The possession of place, of public political places, is not only falsely 
assumed as high evidence of official fitness, but, still more unfortunately, 
is it frquently treated by the general historian and the memoir writer as 
the sole evidence of distinguished talent, and of public power and influ- 
ence. And more especially is it true that the great mass of American 
authors who have essayed to write the life or notice the success of an 
eminent lawyer, have seemed to labor under a sense of the littleness and 
obscurity of their hero until his purely /)ro/fssto?iaZ life was abandoned — 
until he could be spoken of as no longer enthusiastically devoted to one 
of the most noble and ennobling studies in the whole round of human 
inquiry, and as having successfully entered that partisan field where 
thousands and tens of thousands of low, mean, and ignorant men rise to 
high position and influence. It is only when they have been elected to 
something, that tangible evidence of eminence, greatness, and power, is 
supposed to be discovered, and the subject raised up to the dignity of 
legitimate history. They hardly touch upon the early life of the stu- 
dent, the struggles manfully made with the discouragements of poverty, 
ill health, obscure locations, meagre libraries, and poor instruction, all 
overcome by perseverance and energy, in the details of which the young 
reader may see a picture of difficulties conquered, wliich, in his own 
case, he had supposed unconquerable. The early professional obstacles, 
when, without books, clients, money, or influential friends, a meagerly- 
furnished office has been opened with faint hopes and dreary prospects — 
the excitements of early practice — the varied character of success, whe- 
ther brilliant, sudden, and attractive, or gradual, solid, and noiseless — 
the course of investigation — the manner of constructing arguments and 
briefs — the mode of preparation for trial, and peculiarities in its con- 
duct — the extent and kind of professional practice — the treatment of 
clients — the degree of pecuniary success, and the nature and limits of 
the reputation won by the life whose picture is drawn, are all, in the 
great majority of instances, wholly overlooked. The law, with all its 



H. H. KMMONS, OF MICHIGAN. 453 

great responsibilities, its solemn duties, its showy, popular, and ambition- 
gratifying successes, its power and influence upon every state and nation 
where its principles are cultivated and studied as a science, its high and 
powerful positions, is considered as an instrumentality only in the hands 
of its professors for merely partisan political achievement. It is not 
treated as an ultimate object, but rather as a road leading to loftier 
fields of public activity above and beyond it. 

These things have so moulded public taste that the details of success, 
however great and sudden, of merely legal attainments, however pro- 
found and varied, when unassociated with any manifestation of popular 
favor beyond extensive joro/cs5?o/!a/ employment, appear, to the minds 
of the great majority, tame and trivial. 

But very few of the really great lawyers of our country have risen to 
political eminence. They who have thus shone in both departments 
have a long list of professional triumphs to grace their history before 
they have entered that field of party servitude, outside of which, during 
the last half century, no public man has obtained or preserved a place 
and political power in our country. And he whose life offers no extra- 
ordinary attainments, success, or power, at the bar or upon the bench, 
■which presents no incidents indicative of great talent and industry, or 
adaptation to the profession, and is in no way distinguished from the 
great mass of lawyers around him, except that he has, in common with 
ten thousand men, who are not even nominally lawyers, succeeded in 
procuring a party nomination, can have no peculiar interest for the pro- 
fession, or afford any useful instruction or guide for the young and am- 
bitious student. On the contrary, the incidents in the life of one who 
has been exclusively devoted to his profession, never held an office, ob- 
tained or sought a nomination, never attended a political caucus, or en- 
deavored to control the selection of a candidate, and who has risen to 
the first rank in his profession, obtained wealth, high standing and influ- 
ence, a gratifying reputation, and, indeed, everything which legitimately 
attaches us to the fortunes of a learned, laborious, and eminently suc- 
cessful lawyer, are all well worthy of a student's examination, and will 
encourage his perseverance, or correct his mistakes. 

It is with these views that the following memoir is presented to the 
profession, in full confidence that it will safely stand the test of our cri- 
ticism. There may be some men in Michigan, besides its one great 
leading statesman, better known beyond the limits of the state than 
Mr. E. But, as a thorough technical lawyer, he has no equal of his 
age, and no superior at all at the Michigan bar. No man so thoroughly 
and e.xhaustingly argues a legal question, nor more closely and success- 
fully conducts causes before a jury. There are some his superiors in 
the mere beauties of declamation — some his equals in shrewdness and 
management at the circuit, and amonfl; the older lawyers and on the 
bench, perhaps, he may be equaled in technical learning ; but I know 
the common judgment of the state is but echoed, when I say that, for 
a union of all the qualities which go to make up the strong lawyer, for 
a combination of natural talent, logical accuracy, extraordinarily laborious 
habits, universal preparation, instantaneous perception of error, and 
readiness of answer; for strong, illustrative and convincing argument, 
and, when great principles are concerned, impassioned eloquence ; for 



454 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

subtlety of distinction, without ever being known to be indistinct or 
vague ; for fairness, for boldness, for all allowable strategy and manage- 
ment which the detection of falsehood and the support of truth demand; 
for that general walk in life, that course in court which wins the confi- 
dence and secures influence with the bench ; for a union of all these high 
qualities, he is beyond all comparison, thus early in his professional 
life, the first man in his state. The vast extent of his practice, and the 
magnitude and variety of his employments, prove that this high praise 
is in nowise beyond the practical and constantly-manifested judgment 
of the community in which he lives. 

The professional success of Mr. E. was rapid beyond parallel. He 
had no probation, but entered immediately upon the highest and se- 
verest labors of the law. He has been at the bar but little more than 
twelve years, and at the time when, a few months since, ill health com- 
pelled him to turn over for a time his immense business, while he 
makes an attempt, by travel, to recruit his strength, his practice was 
not only larger than any other man in his own state, but, so far as the 
writer believes, it had no equal in the northwest. He was engaged 
in nearly all the more important and more severely-contested cases in 
Michigan, and was frequently employed as counsel in the adjoining 
states. His immense practice was by no means obtained or aided by 
the moderation of his charges. Five hundred, and one thousand dollars 
are familiar items of credits for retainers on his books, and, in many in- 
stances, double the latter sum has been received. Considering the 
standard charges of the bar at which he practises, these rates evince an 
employment in the very highest walks of his profession, and in the most 
important and difficult cases. It is true he has had the benefit of a 
most popular and talented partner, a man of considerable eloquence 
and power as a jury advocate, which, in many instances, it is highly 
probable has induced the retainer of his firm. But it is well known that 
the legal questions presented in each contest have mainly depended 
upon the efforts of Mr. E. Had he pursued his profession alone, and 
years ago confined his attention solely to the argument of legal questions 
in the court of last resort, and the duties of counsel in the trial of causes 
at the circuit, as he now does, he would have obtained a still higher 
fame, as a jurist, than he at present enjoys. 

In the early history of Mr. E. there is nothing extraordinary. Its 
particulars are worthy of notice only as they illustrate how unnecessary 
for eminent future success are remarkable and precocious natural deve- 
lopments or premature devotion to study. During his boyish years, 
he was characterized more for boldness and vigor of action, an untiring 
spirit which usually gave him the leadership of young companions than 
for studious and intellectual habits. Though seldom tyrannically ex- 
ercised, he was celebrated for an uncommon degree of physical courage, 
and, when exasperated, of even recklessness. A degree of boldness in 
the assertion and defence of what he esteemed his rights, far beyond 
the common measure, when but a mere lad, obtained for him much no- 
toriety. The author of this memoir being present at a meeting between 
Mr. E. and a gentlemun who knew him intimately in youth, listened 
with great interest and wonder to an extended list of really extraor- 
dinary feats and contests of which he was the hero. Some really 



H. H. EMMONS, OF MICHIGAN. 455 

amusing and inherent interest had been selected for insertion, but the 
length to which other more illustrative and instructive materials have 
extended this notice has caused their erasure. They all evince a bold, 
determined spirit, and if the particulars w^ere not glossed by the lapse 
of time and the partialities of friendship, they indicated, also, a sense of 
justice and early devotion to truth and honor which must have wholly 
assuaged any fears which the violence attending some of them may 
have elicited for his future life. The same indomitable perseverance 
and unceasing activity with which he accomplished his early exploits 
mark, in an eminent degree, his after-life. It has carried him through 
difficulties and professional contests of a peculiarly trying and afflicting 
nature, and caused him to pass triumphantly through scenes of conflict 
and unusual opposition, which would have crushed ninety-nine men in 
the hundred. It, beyond all doubt, characterizes his public reputation, 
and produces that rankness of grasp with which he seizes upon every- 
thing of a public nature which succeeds in enlisting his sympathies. He 
does nothing by halves ; what he touches he leads in. It impels him 
forward wholly irrespective of personal consequences. So marked is the 
latter peculiarity, that Avhen the health of Mr. E., at a public dinner, 
had been proposed, that portion of the preliminary remarks which ac- 
corded to him the advocacy of what he deemed right, irrespective of its 
popularity or its personal effect, called from the audience an audible 
and universal assent. 

To his political party he owes nothing. No clique, or combination 
of men, have aided his advancement. And, although extensively 
known as a public man, without his profession, it is more as a leader and 
friend of the various movements for intellectual and moral improvement 
than as a party politician. 

It is true he is, in his own peculiar mode, an ardent politician, but it 
is only because he is ardent in everything which he deems essential. He 
goes out to a political argument as he goes up to the Supreme Court — 
prepared. Having a definite object, obtaining which, or learning it is 
unattainable, he returns to his library as if no agitating contest had 
ever solicited his labors from it. So fixed are his rules and habits, that 
he returns to his office invariably after a public political effort, and 
however difficult the duty, forces his mind back, before retiring to rest, 
to the legal subject he left for his political study. 

The family of Mr. E., which, though never wealthy, and sometimes, 
by the accident of business, really poor, was yet eminently respectable, 
always commanding a high social position, and stimulating in the do- 
mestic circle habits of thoughtfulness, and sound, substantial conversa- 
tion. Though neither himself, nor either of his talented or distinguished 
brothers, was regularly educated at schools, the activity of the family 
mind, the constant discussion of current topics, fitted him, at an early 
day, for those professional contests in which, with a success equal to 
that of any man in the northwest, he has subsequently engaged. 

Nor is this reference to the intellectual activity of the family of Mr. 
E., one of those meaningless things which is so frequently said of the 
family relatives of a successful man. He has a younger brother at 
Milwaukie, in Wisconsin, who read his profession in his office, and who, 
like Mr. E., left a mercantile clerkship for the study of the orofession. 



456 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

He has equal talent, is making equal progress, and is, though but just 
commencing his profession, in the very first rank, doing the most im- 
portant, lucrative, and extensive business of any lawyer of his state. 
He has never been in school since a mere lad, and from a very early age 
was constantly engaged in laborious mercantile pursuits. Eminent 
success, repeated triumphs over old, educated and experienced men in 
such circumstances is conclusive evidence of the very highest talent. 

He has another brother in Michigan, whose brilliant and extraordi- 
nary career has been impeded by that cruel and common misfortune 
which so often strikes down the warm-hearted and talented young men 
of our country. But before the great curse of our nation arrested his 
rapid rise, it was far more sudden and brilliant than that of either of 
his brothers. His talents are indeed remarkable. A.t the age of six- 
teen, alone, he came to Michigan as a mercantile clerk, without a friend 
to aid him, or a letter of introduction, without education save that 
which the natural intellectual activity of his whole family impelled him 
to acquire in the midst of his business labors. When scarcely nineteen, 
two years before, according to the laws and constitution ofthe state, he m'os 
entitled to hold the office, he was elected secretary to the legislature in 
opposition to several old and leading politicians of the state. The first 
volume of the laws of the State of Michigan were published under the 
supervision of young J. P. C. Emmons, a lad of nineteen, who was 
elected to the post which imposed the duty, not by the collateral influ- 
ence of others, but because, having acted in the same department in a 
subordinate capacity the former year, his talents and popular manners 
made nearly every member unwilling to place another above him, how- 
ever old, experienced and influential. He also read law with Mr. H. 
H. E., and until his habits became unsteady bid fair to outstrip every 
competitor. He has been once a member of the state legislature. He 
is again, with reformed habits, applying himself to duty, and if sustain- 
ed by Providence in his present resolutions, but few years will compel 
the professional lines to open and let him pass on to the front rank. 

A third brother, beloved by the whole city, whose precocious mind 
had already attracted much attention, died two years since, at the age 
of sixteen. He had been but little at school, but like each of his older 
brothers, had early entered a store as a clerk, and like them, had de- 
voted himself arduously to study. Such works as Alison's Europe, 
Macauley's England, Thier's lievolution, Bancroft's United States, had 
not only been read carefully by him, but their historical assertions ex- 
amined, and the political views analyzed and reviewed at great length. 
He left voluminous manuscripts of a character indicating a mind of the 
noblest and loftiest cast, and the most precocious and singular acute- 
ness. Had he been spared none can doubt that he would have over- 
topped the most successful of his talented family. No boy of his age 
was ever mourned by a greater number of admiring and sincere friends 
than Frederick A. Emmons. 

His mother and sisters have no public literary reputation, but those 
who know them, perceive that the great source of their brother's success 
may be traced to the leading traits of mind common to every member 
.of the family. 

His father was admitted to the bar in the State of New- York, but 



H. H. EMMONS, OF MICHIGAN. 457 

being early led into the field of party politics his profession was aban- 
doned for the editorship of a political journal. As a partisan writer, he 
was celebrated for originality and strength. His paper attracted much 
attention in the state; and when at a later period in life he concluded 
to return to the practice of the law, he received advantageous offers of 
connections from the learned and talented editors of several of the lead- 
ing journals of the eastern cities. During the few years that he devo- 
ted himself to the study and practice of the law at Detroit, few men 
ever made more rapid progress in professional learning. Indeed few 
knew and none would have suspected that the thirty preceding years 
had been spent in the editorial chair instead of labors at the bar. 
Until his death, a few years after his arrival at Detroit, he maintained a 
leading place in his profession. 

Mr. Emmons commenced his professional studies without any regu- 
lar course of .scientific education. He was not, however, without the ad- 
vantages of great study and mental discipline. He is not held up as 
one of those mental wonders who are great without effort, know much 
without any investigation, and astound the world by their instinctive 
profundity. We do not believe in such prodigies. When they are 
supposed to be discovered, it is but mistaking the energetic and deter- 
mined man who educates himself, for one who has not been educated 
at all. The study and acquirements of Mr. Emmons are worthy of 
notice only as their extent and success may encourage others who de- 
sire the results he has obtained, but erroneously believe that they have 
no opportunity, no time, no power, to attain them. 

The business of his father's office, while an editor, engaged nearly the 
entire time of Mr. Emmons, who was the eldest son. The establish- 
ment of routes, the circulation of the journal, and political circulars and 
pamphlets, and the collection of dues, kept him from school at that age 
when ninety-nine boys in the hundred, in the same rank in life, are care- 
fully kept there. But, although absent three days in the week, he was 
universally up with his classes. His Latin grammar lessons were 
nearly all learned in the saddle, except three months at a select school. 
He never had any other instruction besides that which he obtained in 
the common schools of his town. During his clerkship, although win- 
ning invariably the confidence of, and giving entire satisfaction to his em- 
ployer, he was a close student, never retiring to his bed without giving 
at least two hours to his books. In winter, he seldom rose later than 
half-past four or five, and thus secured to himself some two or three 
hours for study before the business of the day commenced. Yet he was 
still intending himself for a merchant; and with no object beyond ihe 
love of study, and a determination to take a stand among intelligent 
and learned gentlemen, he was pursuing this indefatigable course. He 
had two early friends, each of whose example, he has frequently said, 
alternately controlled his intention and revolutionized his resolutions. 
James P. Cronkhite, Esq., now a wealthy and indefatigable merchant of 
New- York city, but who is at the same time entitled to rank among the 
leading literary men of his state, was among the most intimate com- 
panions of his boyhood. He was some years older than E., and his 
early habits of study amidst his business avocations he has frequently 
said influenced his own application. John H. Martindale, Esq., a lead- 



458 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

ing and talented young lawyer of Western New-York, now practising 
at Rochester, in tiiat state, was also an equally intimate associate; and 
when the latter obtained an appointment at West Point, a constant cor- 
respondence was kept up between them. While E. was a clerk, Mar- 
tindale was a cadet at the military academy, earning fame and triumph 
as a laborious and successful student. Before they parted they pur- 
sued their studies together, and with the romance and confidence of in- 
experienced lads, laid many plans for future professional efforts, and 
drew many a picture of public success. Letter after letter came from 
Martindale filled with expressions of wonder, regret, and expostulation, 
that the bright plans they had formed for the future could thus be given 
up. Though at first all this made but slight impression, other things 
combined to aid their eflect, and the counting-room was at last aban- 
doned for the bar. 

He was entirely without means, but relied upon what he might earn as 
a student in inferior courts, and being relieved from anxiety by a knowl- 
edge that, if necessary, he would receive from home everything to render 
him entirely comfortable and respectable. Boarding at his father's 
house, and avoiding thus the little expenses which young men in society 
away from home arc obliged to incur, his personal expenses were very 
small, and it soon appeared that the result of his justice-court practice 
would not only give him a handsome support but enable him to lay up 
something for the future. 

Mr. Emmons entered the office of Messrs. Stowe and Stetson, at 
Keeseville, in the northern part of the State of New-York, men of de- 
cided ability and fair practice, but neither of them inclined to devote 
any time to the examination of a student or the direction of his studies. 
The universal, and as Mr. Emmons insists, the inappropriate four vol- 
umes of Blackstone were put into his hands. These he found dry and 
uninteresting, and although short-hand notes of each of the chapters were 
made, he became but little interested. Against the advice of others and 
the usual custom, he read before finishing them other more practical 
treatises. Chitty's Contracts, Cowen's Justice Court Treatise, Colyer's 
Partnerships, Phelp's Evidences, Kent and other works were better 
relished. But no work was ever passed rapidly through. A sufficient 
number of the citations were examined to thoroughly understand the 
application of principles. This course is always recommended by Mr. 
Emmons to his students. He insists that nine law-books in ten actu- 
ally misinform the student. The writer has heard him put the following 
illustration : Take twenty intelligent, educated men, and read to them 
some familiar legal maxim, and ask each for his understanding of its 
meaning and application, and no two will agree, and probably no one 
be right. But read to them the reported cases in full, from which the 
rule is deduced, and each, with the additional reading which the cases 
would undoubtedly stimulate, would perceive its true meaning and prac- 
tical effect. His habits of notation are carried, to say the least, to the 
limit of usefulness. They were acquired when a student, and he now 
declares himself unable to arrive at just conclusions without continu- 
ing the habit. He commenced when a student elaborate preparations 
of his (feuses in justice's court. Everything was of course new. The 
mode of proving title to a promissory note, and the rule of damages, 



H. H. EMMONS, OF MICHIGAN. 459 

were mapped out as methodically, and all the cases, ancient and modern, 
as critically analysed, as though he were going to asl< the court of last 
resort in the nation, to overturn some long conceded doctrine. The 
mode of notation was full and minute, bringing out boldly and conclu- 
sively the point to be established. If the contrary was contended by 
counsel ; if the statement of facts showed it the only point in the case ; 
if the judge met and expressly overruled the precise distinction, antici- 
pated in argument on his own cause ; if the case questioned or sanc- 
tioned former ones; if it had a peculiar history in court, all was men- 
tioned in the memoranda. Short suggestive notes of its general appli- 
cation in his own cause were carefully made. Some leading fact or 
thing in the case is selected by way of aiding the memory to recall its 
details. Experience taugiit him the title of the case would not do so; 
but if, in ever so meagre a manner, he stated the most simple outline of its 
facts, a glance at his memoranda instantaneously-brought up tlie details 
of the case. For his opponent to announce Doe vs. Smith in replevin, 
trespass, or ejectment, seldom enabled him to recognize the report. But 
the moment he reached a single fact in the statement, all was in the 
memory as fresh as if he had just risen from the book. 

During his clerkship his course of study was not methodical, or so far 
as professional reading was concerned, excessively laborious. His pre- 
paration for particular arguments was always masterly ; indeed, he 
seemed to require the stimulus of anticipated contest to arouse him to 
great effort. It was in his extraordinarily large justice-court practice, 
and in the preparation for counsel of briefs for the argument of the va- 
rious certioraris and appeals to which his almost invariable successes 
gave rise, that his great progress when a student was made. 

His four years' clerkship passed without anything remarkable beyond 
the ordinary flattery which a tolerably industrious student, a popular 
speaker, frequently called to officiate as orator on public occasions, 
so commonly receives. That he was the leading and most promising 
young man in that portion of the state no one doubted ; but the feeble- 
ness of his health, and frequent recurrence of severe attacks of sickness, 
forbade a prophecy of eminent success in a laborious profession on the 
part of his more intimate friends and family. 

The last two years were spent in the office of the Hon. Henry H. 
Ross, of Essex, a gentleman of fine education, great attainments as a law- 
yer, of wealth and local influence, who, in return for service as a clerk 
merely nominal, received him as a member of his family, and afforded 
the advantages of an extensive library, and what was then to him of 
great consequence, and which he feels daily influencing his future pro- 
fessional life, the benefits of many a useful lecture upon the pathway 
before him. Mr. Emmons says, that " General Ross had quite pardon- 
ably got the idea that I thought much of my oratorical powers, and 
counted on well-turned sentences entirely too much for future success. 
I heard on this subject very little theory. Not a word was said directly 
imputing such a taste or such a reliance. But, as though by way of in- 
teresting professional reminiscences, (and such they really were,) the 
early history of all the great lawyers whose names I saw from day to 
day in their reports, and who graced the high judicial places in the state, 
were detailed, and the fact prominently brought out, that as students 



460 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICAKS. 

they were privately and unostentatiously studious ; that they had no 
reputation for mere eloquence, made no public speeches, and grew to 
greatness so gradually, and so quietly attracted public attention, that no 
one ever dreamed of calling the best of them a genius. Another class 
was also passed in review whose precocious and showy talents had 
early led them aside from the profession, when, without future growth, 
or any considerable success, they must even rest satisfied with the low 
praise of possessing bright parts and active talents, and with the power 
of success, but wanting the application and energy to achieve it. The 
force of habit, the irresistible power of the early tendencies, were illus- 
trated by hundreds of examples, till I believe 1 saw in a new light the 
road before me. I discovered dangers to my ardent and headstrong 
temperament which, but for these timely and kindly cautions, I might 
not have avoided. 

"I determined to seek a standing at the bar first, to do my whole duty 
to my clients, and never seek without the profession the slightest ad- 
vancement. If collateral success or reputation came, I determined it 
should be accidental, or when I had faithfully tried my utmost efforts 
at the bar." 

Mr. Emmons was on two occasions permitted to address juries in the 
Supreme Court, while yet a student, a thing, the author ventures to say, 
with but few parallels in the State of New- York. His own statement 
of the circumstances do not show that it was so much to add strength 
to the cause, because eminent counsel were engaged, as out of friendship 
to himself; but the fact shows that he had made much progress, and was 
quite ready for practice when he came to the bar ; indeed, his future 
history must amply illustrate this. 

llie first cause which he ever tried, or rather had tried in a court of re- 
cord — for with all his experience he had not the courage to try it without 
assistance — was that of Bromley vs. Flack in the Essex Common Pleas, 
an appeal from a judgment given against his client by a local magis- 
trate. The case was trover for five tons of hay, which in evidence turned 
out to be part of a larger quantity from which it had never been 
severed. He had intended to try his cause alone. The amount in con- 
troversy was small and his client poor, but when the docket of causes 
before it was nearly exhausted, his confidence failed him, and applying 
to Mr, Stow, with whom he had studied, then engaged in the defence 
of a criminal, obtained his promise of assistance. There was no oppor- 
tunity for an interview until the cause was called, and hence Mr. Stow 
knew nothing of its merits. He gathered all from the opening of the 
plaintiff's counsel, and immediately moved a nonsuit upon the ground 
before suggested. Mr. E. immediately put a book into his hand to 
sustain the objection. In reply, the opposing counsel read several cases 
fully supporting the action. These had all been carefully noted in the 
brief of Mr. Emmons, and the judgments overruling them referred to at 
length. They too were passed to his counsel, and owing to the want 
of an interview before the trial, all was necessarily done in a manner 
to attract considerable attention. The cases, as every lawyer knows, are 
directly in conflict, and before a court of no very extended legal learn- 
ing, just calculated to beget what then happened — a very spirited and 
altogether the most attractive merely legal argument of the term. The 



H. H, EMMONS, OF MICHIGAN. 461 

plaintiff was nonsuited, and Mr. E.'s client came off victorious. But 
this is not the point, in so ordinary a transaction, which makes it worthy 
of notice here. After the juupe had announced the opinion, and before 
the jury left their seats, before an overflowing court-house, Mr. Stow 
rose and said he felt it his duty to make a few remarks, with which he 
doubted not every member of the bar would sympathize, and the pro- 
priety of which he deemed justified by the presence of a number of stu- 
dents and younger members of the bar. He then unfolded the legal 
brief of Mr. E., turning it slowly over, page after page, so as to make 
the greatest display of its extent, reading from time to time the short 
condensed statement it contained of the principles of the cases analyzed. 
He then served the brief of testimony in a similar way, calling atten- 
tion particularly to the fact that every question of competency and 
relevancy which could have arisen, had the trial proceded, had been anti- 
cipated; and although defeat was not anticipated, that the rule of damages 
was thoroughly considered, and authorities noted in support of all the 
positions taken. He concluded by saying that, in the whole course of 
his professional life, without any reference to its magnitude or interest, 
he had never known a cause better prepared than the present. It 
seemed complete in all its parts, and recommending an examination of 
the papers as models for his young friends, he returned them to Mr. E. 
The thing was so unexpected, so uncommon, so bold a deviation from 
the usages of courts, that it nearly overwhelmed the subject of the ex 
traordinary compliment. 

Mr. Emmons has said since, that when he was obliged to ask a 
senior to go forward in the cause, to give up as he thought the oppor- 
tunity of developing the results of his industry, and fidelity to his 
client, that he felt sad and disappointed ; that he had looked ahead to 
a personal triumph, as well as one for his client, and resigned the oppor- 
tunity of making an argument with feelings of reluctance; that when 
the extraordinary expose of his counsel thus gave him all, and a thousand 
told more than he dreamed of achieving, he said he began to realize how 
private and noiseless study would make its results known to the public 
without public orations or political speeches ; that few single incidents 
of his life have so decidedly encouraged laborious preparation as this. 
He. remembers the author of the compliment with great gratitude and 
warmth. As the only return he has ever been able to make is a con- 
stant practice of great liberality and encouragement towards beginners 
in the profession, which so striking an example taught them, this he has 
faithfully followed. His law library, one of the largest in the West, his 
own great fund of legal information, without fee or charge, is ever ready 
for the student or young lawyer. His extensive case of briefs is filled 
with slips noticing their loan to various professional friends. Arguments 
the most elaborate, costing months of labor, are readily handed out as 
containing a leading to doctrines sought by young professional inquirers. 
Whatever of liberality he has received, and he confesses to much from 
the learned members of the bar among whom he counts his good for- 
tune to have read, it has been amply repaid in the mode of all others 
they would most desire in a similar generosity towards others. 

Soon after his admission to the bar, although located in a distant part 
of the state, he received from Nicholas Hill, Esq., then of Saratoga 



462 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

Springs, one of the learned authors of " Cowen and Hill's Notes," an 
otter of copartnership. He was at first pleased with the offer, and daz- 
zled with the prospect of thus immediately approaching the focus of 
legal learning in the state. But as he looked over the long lists 
of learned men at the New-York bar, and reflected upon his own feeble 
health, he feared his ability for the iron labors of that incessant study 
which could alone distinguish him at Saratoga and at Albany. Influ- 
enced by the common error of the East, that at the West there is but 
little legal learning, he thought that with less labor, if his health should 
fail, he could there succeed. Accordingly he made choice of Cleveland, 
in Ohio, and formed a professional connection with a gentleman of that 
city. His father had just before removed to Detroit, in Michigan, and 
without communicating to him his expectation, had taken it for granted 
that his son would follow. Though the elder Mr. Emmons had, as be- 
fore stated, in early life been admitted to the bar, and was a man of far 
more than ordinary talent as a writer, of great knowledge of the world, 
and unusually industrious habits, still he had been so long from the 
practice as to be wholly unfitted to proceed alone. He had commenced 
in a strange city, with a large family, and when the subject of our 
memoir reviewed the circumstances, and learned his father's expecta- 
tations and wishes that he would remain with him, he felt that he had 
no choice left; and though far less pleased with Detroit than Cleveland, 
he followed the suggestions of duty, and immediately entered upon that 
laborious and successful career which has so undeniably placed him in 
the front rank of his profession. 

In order fully to appreciate the circumstances which follow, it is 
necessary to bear in mind that Mr. Emmons procured no letter whatr 
ever to a single citizen of Michigan ; he had laid all his plans, issued his 
cards, and obtained his introduction, and formed his connections, for a 
different state. His father too was quite unexpectedly located at Detroit. 
They were both entire strangers, without an acquaintance at the bar or 
on the bench, and open theretbre to all the force with which any unlucky 
accident or mistake might affect their reputation. 

In these circumstances was commenced by the Messrs. Emmons the 
case, much celebrated in the West, of Eitch & Gilbert vs. Newberry & 
Godell, (reported in 1st Douglas, Mich. Rep. 1.) At this day and in 
many localities, it may seem strange that the question involved could 
excite so severe a contest, and that an erroneous opinion of the law 
should so unusually prevail at a really talented and learned bar. The 
same question however has been since thought of sufficient doubt to be 
considered and decided by the Supreme Court of the State of New- 
York ; and his Honor Judge Metcalf, of Massachusetts, in correspond- 
ence not long since with Mr. Emmons, informed him that the court of 
last resort in that state had followed the decision in F. & G. vs. N. & G. 
It was moreover, at the time of its decision, published in all the leading 
journals in the western states, and became the theme of much newspaper 
controversy. At least in Michigan, the doctrine that a common carrier 
had a lien for his freight on all goods which, in the ordinary course of 
trade he received and carried in good faith, without reference to the letter 
or authority of the consignor to ship them, had never been questioned. 
The diction of Chief Justice Holt, in the old case of York vs. Greenough, 



H. H. EMMONS, OF MICHIGAN 463 

had always been followed. When, without paying the demanded charges, 
a writ of replevin was issued by the Messrs. Emmons to take from the 
hands of a forwarding merchant a large quantity of merchandise, who 
had innocently paid the freight and charges of the carrier, and succeeded 
to all his rights, claiming to maintain the suit on the ground that 
the owner had never consented to the shipment of the goods, and 
might therefore take them wherever found, it was a doctrine so novel, 
so at war with what had for years been conceded to the law, that the 
defendant, under the advice of one of the leading firms of the city, 
arrested for perjury the plaintiff who made the affidavit and procured 
the writ of replevin. And seldom has a criminal complaint and arrest, 
when neither life nor limb has been periled by the imputed crime, been 
attended with more intense excitement and indignation, or greater offi- 
cial energy and zeal for punishment on the part of the prosecution. Mr, 
Emmons appeared for his client, and though he presented his legal 
views in justification of the affidavit at much length, and with his usual 
clearness and force, there was too much prejudice and feeling for their 
appreciation by the magistrate, and his client was discharged solely 
upon the ground, that he was a young and inexperienced man, and had 
been misadvised by injudicious counsel ! The magistrate was a leading 
lawyer, the prosecuting attorney for the state was among the oldest pro- 
fessional men of the former territory, and a man of much influence and 
standing. It was moreover deemed proper by the prosecuting attorney 
to prove by witnesses what the law actually was, and several members 
of the bar rather ludicrously swore on their oaths that Mr. Emmons had 
grossly misadvised his client. Everybody, lawyers and laymen, great 
and small, learned and unlearned, looked upon and proclaimed the new- 
comers as desperate and ignorant practitioners. All this did not in the 
least daunt our hero. There never was an emotion of fear in his nature. 
His young client was sympathized with, calls were made upon him, 
and goodly advice tendered to abandon his suit, and thus show that 
although falsely he had innocently sworn. Fortunately he too proved 
to be a man of mettle, and with unshaken confidence in his counsel, 
who, he had judgment enough to see, adduced most abundant authori- 
ty for the advice he had given, determined still implicitly to follow it, 
and early the next morning, under Mr. Emmons' direction, arrested 
Mr. Newberry, who acted as complainant in the prosecution for perjury 
against himself, for slander and malicious prosecution. This, in the cir- 
cumstances, was indeed a bold measure. And when it is considered 
how difficult is the support in evidence of the latter count, it will pro- 
bably be thought injudicious and rash. But Mr. Emmons deemed a 
prosecution for slander too easily sustained. He saw that such an 
action was maintainable even if his own advice were wrong. For if his 
client swore falsely, yet innocently, the accusation of Newberry, 
many times repeated that he was perjured, would subject him to an 
action, whereas malicious prosecution could not be sustained without 
showing not only that Mr. Newberry's counsel were mistaken as to the 
law, but that the advice was so eminently absurd, so at variance with 
common-sense, that no man of ordinary intelligence and common pru- 
dence would have followed it. This, when the citizen acts upon the 
advice of counsel, is the strong rule in such cases, and to comply with 



464 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

its rigid terms before a jury he fearlessly undertook. To show that 
the furor against himself and client was not only without law, but 
against natural reason, he not only argued before the magistrate, 
but by prompt prosecution assumed to establish judicially in court. The 
arrest of Mr. Newberry added fuel to the flames of professional indig- 
nation ; some who had rather pitied, as indiscreet and inexperienced, now 
yielded to the prevailing opinion that he was reckless and unprincipled. 
Added to his really spirited and bold action was a manner unfortunately 
uncompromising, and in moments of excitement bitter and retaliatory. 
He was a ready debater, clear and illustrative in his arguments, with a 
natural tendency to tartness of reply, and great facility at rendering a 
position laughable and absurd. Opposition but increased all these cha- 
racteristics, and that which, coming in the pathway of a less fiery tempera- 
ment, would have been gently and temporarily bent to, till its force was 
spent, and time and reason had developed its errors and injustice, was 
increased and perpetuated by the invariable alacrity with which Mr. 
Emmons, then just past his majority, with but little knowledge of the 
world, drew his sword for combat with every man who gave provocar 
tion. Many scenes unusual, and of far more than ordinary interest in 
detail, attended his immediately succeeding practice. Their revival now 
would however only keep alive the recollection of that which nothing 
but passion produced, and whose actors, then angry and hostile, are now 
his firmest friends. 

They have, at Mr. E.'s request, been omitted. He says the great 
fault lay in his own impetuous and unyielding nature ; that, though he 
was guilty of no professional wrong, and the arrest, in the outset, of his 
client for perjury was really an outrage, and the abuse of himself cruel 
and unjust, yet all those who were engaged in it were sincere, and really 
believed the law had been violated ; that, though fully sustained by the 
courts, though gratified by the publication of his successes in the journals 
of the day, all this would have been just as full and pleasing had he 
omitted to throw into the cup of his triumphs the bitter dregs of continued 
contest and fierce opposition. 

The full and complete triumph which he obtained in the replevin suit 
against Newberry and Goodell, and the suit against Newberry by Gil- 
lett, for malicious prosecution, not only solaced his feelings, but gave 
him at once a standing as a talented and resolute lawyer. His argu- 
ments in these causes were masterly and learned. That they were never 
exceeded in research and close analysis by a young man of twenty-two, 
who had been but twenty-eight months at the bar, is fearlessly affirmed. 
Especially are his triumphant reply and keen, cutting criticism, his dis- 
posal of the argument that the practice had made the law, his humorous 
illustrations, in which an imaginary code, springing from such a foun- 
tain, figured conspicuously, worthy of attention and ofan insertion here, did 
not too narrow limits prevent it. That a jury under the charge of a 
court, to say the least, not unfavorably disposed towards Mr. Newberry, 
should find that, in the circumstances proven, a man of ordinary 
intelligence and common prudence would not have followed the advice 
of the eminent counsel whom he employed, capped the climax of Mr. 
Emmons' triumph. 

The professional rise of Mr. E. was rapid almost beyond precedent. 



H. H. EMMONS, OF MICHIGAN. 465 



When he arrived in Michigan he had been but just admitted to the bar, 
had never argued a question of law to a court in banc, in his life, and was 
wholly unacquainted with the laws and practice of the new state in which 
he was settled. The reports of the state and the records of the courts, 
both state and federal, will show, that within the very first year of his 
arrival he stood forward among the largest, and especially the most suc- 
cessful, practitioners in the state. In 1840, '41, '42, and '43, no firm 
in the state tried more causes than his own ; and when their attractive- 
ness, the large amounts recovered, the questions involved, and the learn- 
ing displayed in their conduct are considered, it may thus early be said 
of him that, within three years after his admission, so far as the amount 
and character of his business and the mode of its conduct were concerned, 
even then he had no superior. That his reputation had then equaled 
that of many of the old territorial lawyers, of course cannot be said. 
This was being earned, and has now been most abundantly accorded. 
And this peculiarity attended his early practice : the most important 
matters were confidently submitted to his sole management and argu- 
ment, without counsel, in opposition to lawyers of twenty-five and thirty 
years' standing. In no one instance was this confidence regretted. In 
the second and third years of his practice he received very many consul- 
tation fees, and thus early furnished many a brief from which others 
argued in court. That this is unusual, need not be said to lawyers who 
have plodded for twenty years before they have commanded large coun- 
sel fees. Nor was it owing to the want of opposition, to absence of old, 
experienced, and learned counselors located and in active practice in the 
same city. The Hon. William Woodbridge, since govemor of the state, 
and United States senator, was there then, and frequently acted as coun- 
sel ; Hon. Daniel Goodwin, long United States District Attorney, judge 
of the Supreme Court of the state, and now a judge of the Upper Penin- 
sula, an old, able, and powerful lawyer, was in full practice ; Alexan- 
der D, Frazer, Esq., a laborious lawyer of forty years' extensive read- 
ing, was then, as now, ever ready for retainers, and he ranks among 
the ablest professional men in the northwest. His law library is proba- 
bly more extensive than any other private one west of Albany, unless 
it be equaled by that of Mr. E. ; the Hon. B. F. C. Witherell, H. J. 
Backus, Esq., Hon. A. S. Porter, since a United States senator, and 
many others, together with a long list of younger men, well established 
and in good practice when Mr. E. arrived in the city, gave the Detroit 
bar a legal force, brilliancy and talent, which equaled that of any city 
of its numbers. For a young man just past his majority, with no legal 
experience, an entire stranger, without money or influential friends, in 
the midst of an extraordinary, and, as was sometimes thought, over 
cruel opposition, to step at once into the highest rank of such a profes- 
sional circle, without waiting for a moment to learn the discipline, and 
become familiar with the lower, is the most conclusive evidence of de- 
cided ability, and devotion to the means of success. Rise in such cir- 
cumstances must be substantial and merited. It was secured in this in- 
stance by laboriously-prepared, clearly-reasoned, and well-delivered 
arguments. It depended on no fortuitous circumstances. By his talent, 
industry, fidelity, and zeal, he won success in the face of a fierce and 
violent opposition. 

30 



466 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

Even in his best cases he seemed never relieved from labor in the 
slightest degree by the oldest or most able counsel. But every point 
was studied by himself. Having submitted his plan of trial to his as- 
sociate he adopted and transferred to his own memoranda any sugges- 
tions he deemed an improvement. But he never sat down before a 
jury compelled to say, "About this part or that department of the cause 
I know nothing and leave it to my counsel." Pie made it all his own 
and went forward in the case accordingly. 

The following anecdote will illustrate the early age at which he took 
responsibility upon himself and went forward in the most important 
causes. Among his earliest cases of considerable consequence, and very 
soon after his admission, was that of Hale and Hale vs. the ship Mil- 
waukie, (reported in error in 1 Douglass, Mich., p. — ,) and which had 
been instituted by Mr. Emmons in the face of a decision made at Buf- 
falo, in the State of New-York, against other parties claiming for goods 
lost by the same casualty. The whole history of the case is novel and 
interesting, but I feel at liberty here to occupy room by the insertion 
of those particulars only more immediately connected with the main 
incident I wish to introduce. 

On a former trial the evidence of the master and crew had readily 
relieved from all responsibility the owners of the ship. This evidence 
could readily be contradicted by abundant proof, and there was there- 
fore reason to expect an entirely different relation of circumstances 
from the same witnesses now. The substance of the story Mr. Em- 
mons by correspondence had obtained second-hand from others, but 
the only man who had recorded it, or who could furnish a copy of it, 
was the counsel of the defendants who tried the cause in which it was 
given. To withhold it of course was their duty. One man alone could 
be procured who would assume to swear to the captain's former testi- 
mony, and he, though a respectable witness, was an entire stranger to 
the jury and was a party somewhat interested in the question at issue. 
The plaintiff rested, after making out the usual prima facie case against 
the vessel attached, when the master and his sailors, one after the other, 
took the stand, and swore to courses run, to a state of weather, the con- 
dition and capacity of the ship, and the conduct of the seamen, entirely 
different from the Buffalo statements. It seemed to all that the defence 
was clear. The plaintiff's counsel had fully interrogated the defen- 
dant's witnesses as to their former statements and evidence, but, they 
having been informed that the plaintiff could make no proof whatever 
of their former oaths, all. with unblushing boldness and flippancy, was 
denied. The plaintiff's only witness, a plain, intelligent man, who clear- 
ly and positively rehearsed their former testimony, stated that as an in- 
terested party he was present, remembered it distinctly and could not 
be mistaken. He was, however, boldly sworn down by the captain and 
seamen. At this point the court adjourned for the evening; the coun- 
sel associated with Air, Emmons asked the clerk to suffer him to take 
home certain depositions, which, as he supposed, he received in a court 
envelop from the hands of the proper officer. On reaching home he 
found, instead of the court files, the clerk had put up the copies of the 
depositions furnished to one of the counsel for the defendants. Per- 
ceiving at first nothing private in their nature, and that they were copies 



n. H. EMMONS, OF MICHIGAN. 46*7 

of what was wanted, he commenced their perusal and soon came to a 
paper headed, " Copy of Dickson's testimoni/ taken at Buffalo.'''' For- 
tune had thus, at that late stage of the trial, placed in the hands of plain- 
tiff's counsel the long-sought evidence. The paper was immediately 
taken to Mr. Emmons' office, and in his absence a copy made and laid 
upon his table, leaving to him the responsibility of using it thus ob- 
tained. The depositions were then re-inserted in the court envelop and 
returned to the clerk, and again came into the possession of the court with- 
out any knowledge that they had been seen by any one. The matter was 
discussed in the morning, and Mr. Emmons, learning that no fraud had 
been used in obtaining it, declared that he would not only willingly 
assume the responsibility of its use, but should esteem it a flagrant 
cowardice and breach of duty thus to suffer a corrupt witness to escape 
and sacrifice his client's interest, when to prevent it nothing need be 
done but to read, copy and use a paper which belonged to the oppos- 
ing party, but which, upon no principle of morality or enlightened prac- 
tice, could be withheld for the protection of known perjury, if such had 
been committed. The testimony thus obtained agreed minutely with 
that given by the plaintiff's witness, and still farther and more essen- 
tially contradicted the defendant's witnesses on the present trial. The 
whole day was adroitly spent in collateral points, when towards even- 
ing the main witness of defendant was recalled by the plaintiff under 
permission of the court for further cross-examination. Mr. Emmons 
produced a chart containing a projection of the courses and distances 
then sworn to by the witnesses, showing that they led many miles 
away into the woods of Wisconsin, and after sufficiently confusing them 
in an unavailable attempt to re-adjust their story and make it consis- 
tent with any plausible hypothesis, he suddenly called for the chart, 
and walking up toward the witness, said, " Captain Dixon, it is but fair 
that I should at last inform you that I have a copy full and complete 
of your Buffalo testimony ; that I know you have read it since it was 
taken down — have assented to its truth within a very recent period. 
Listen, while I read the first sentences of your testimony then given, 
and answer upon your oath whether you so swore." He then read the 
first portion, and the witness in great trepidation remained silently 
looking upon his counsel. Mr. Emmons, without insisting upon an 
answer, proceeded through the whole paper, submitting each sentence 
and subject in a distinct question, without eliciting any other reply from 
the witness than that to some portions of it he thought he did not pre- 
cisely so slate. Impliedly all was conceded ; still, the witness had not in 
terras admitted its truth. The plaintiff had no means of proving it was 
a copy further than finding it among the papers of the defendant's counsel 
so labeled, and this proof of doubtful efficacy the associate of Mr. Em- 
mons, in the circumstances of its procuration, was unwilling to submit 
at all. In this dilemma, the plan was to let it all pass off with a flourish 
of contempt, ti> rely upon the witness's silence and confusion, rather 
than goad him up to a denial of its authenticity, for which they really 
believed him sufficiently bold. In preparing for this course, and to dis- 
miss the witness from the stand under the most impressive circum- 
stances, and more especially to inform in some way the jury of the fact, 
Mr. Emmons, who frequently keeps up a running comment with his 



468 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

vritness, on cross-examination, with great deliberation and emphasis, re- 
marked, that the paper he held in his hand was an exact copy from that 
then actually held in the hand of the defendant's own counsel. No 
sooner had these words fell from his lips than the counsel of defendant, 
excited beyond all control, and taking it for granted his own clerks had 
betrayed him, or that his paper had been stolen, sprung to his feet, and 
in language somewhat extravagant asserted that he had no such original. 
The denial was full and distinct, but beyond all doubt what the eminent 
and unimpeachable counsel Avho made it did not intend to say, and what 
he was hardly conscious of his saying at all. Indeed, his succeeding ac- 
cusations and concessions evinced that he did not suppose he had 
made such denial. Still it was promptly seized on by Mr. Emmons. 
He arrested the onset of his opponent at this^rs^ issue, whether he had 
such a paper. He would not proceed to the settlement of other mat- 
ters till the decided advantage given him by this unlucky, and as 
he after the trial said, he had no doubt entirely involuntary denial, 
was fully employed before the jury with its full effect. The 
scene which ensued is indescribable. The witness, in confusion on 
the stand; the jury all on their feet, staring with wonder at the devel- 
opments of the chart, and amazed at the hardihood which stood so 
clearly and instantaneously developed, and which had seemingly stood 
impregnable the test of five days' siege; the extraordinary spectacle 
at the bar of high words, and hard accusations, every one seemingly 
forgetting the cause, the proprieties of the court and the respect due to 
each other, until when the scene was over it was discovered that the 
court had actually adjourned Je facto, without having gone through the 
forms of such a proceeding. I said all had seemed to forget the cause. 
There was one who, though but just admitted to practice, then engaged 
almost in his first important case, did not for an instant forget the issue 
or the jury. It is for the exemplification of this so early developed 
characteristic that we insert this anecdote. In the midst of, I had al- 
most said the tumult, for it nearly approached one, Mr. Emmons, turn- 
ing from his antagonist, and then summoning his clerks and the as- 
sociates of his opponent to declare the fact that the original of what he 
had read was then existing in the bundle of his adversary, appealed 
to the jury in the most solemn and energetic manner not to suffer their 
minds to be for a moment distracted from the guilty cause of all which 
had happened, as he considered the course of the counsel so complete a 
confession of everything they desired to show, he deemed it wholly un- 
necessary to keep him longer on the stand as a witness. 

When it was discovered that the judge was gone, the jury sepa- 
rated, the clerk's desk locked, and the bar filled with the bystanders, it 
was quite naturally concluded that they were no longer in court; and, 
though somewhat less excited, a more minute and deliberate inquiry and 
discussion of the mysterious procuration of the copy commenced. Here 
Mr. D. necessarily left his counsel, through whose agency it had been 
obtained, to his own explanations, if any he saw fit to give. This was 
very imperfectly done, and the result was, its procuration was pro- 
nounced dishonorable, and the most severe epithets were applied to 
counsel, which the gentleman concerned but feebly parried. The jury- 
were still present, and it seemed to Mr. E, that the current was actually 



H. H. EMMONS, OF MICHIGAN. 469 

being turned and setting in against his cause, and that more odium was 
about to rest upon the mode of procuring the copy than upon the false 
hood and corruption which its production developed. He had started 
to leave the court-room, when this state of things arrested his atten- 
tion. He hastily returned, laid down his books, and, after assum- 
ing fully the responsibility of everything which had been done, with 
great earnestness and even vehemence, he reviewed the whole testimo- 
ny of the captain, commented upon the fact of withholding the paper, 
and suffering him to swear when it must have been known he was 
swearing falsely, the guilt of trying now in the presence of the jury to 
arrest attention from this, by magnifying a petty discourtesy into a 
great offence — one, he said, happening in circumstances which demanded 
the dashing in pieces of ten thousand such laws — and was at great length, 
and with a violence which defied all interruption, proceeding to rear a 
methodical justification for the act, interwoven with an equally convinc- 
ing statement about his former correspondence to procure the copy, 
and the secretion of this one, until the attorney of record, on the other 
side, appealed to him to desist, as the jury were present. To this he 
said he would yield, and was sorry it had not occurred to him to address 
it to his own cotinsel immediately upon the adjournment of the court. 

The old and eminent counsel engaged with Mr. E., and for the de- 
fence, met the following morning, and agreed upon a statement to be 
made in court, which would reconcile, consistently with the honor of 
each, the procuration of the paper by the one and the denial by the 
other, and Mr. E. was informed of what was deemed by all parties an 
eminently happy adjustment of so severe and violent a difficulty. To 
their mutual surprise the young attorney, wholly blind to personal conse- 
quences, and intent only on securing in the minds of the jury every fact 
demanded by his long and laborious legal brief, rejected promptly the 
arrangement. He demanded that the matter should be left where the 
last evening he had placed it, without one word or comment other than 
to sa}% in the most general terms, that each acquitted the other of any 
dishonorable motive ; or the entire facts, just as they occurred, should 
be open to the use of each before the jury, with all the license which 
the court should deem proper to tolerate ; or a statement immediately 
drawn by himself, which impliedly conceded the main/crc/ he wished to 
establish, must be adopted. No argument could move him from this po- 
sition. The counsel yielded, and the cause proceeded with a concession, 
as it untimately turned out, of what the plaintiff could not otherwise 
have proved. Considering the age, experience and eminence of the 
counsel concerned, the youth and short standing at the bar of Mr. E., 
his resolute and persevering course was as extraordinary as it was suc- 
cessful. 

The following is given as an instance of the bold character of his 
strategy and his masterly conduct of jury causes. 

A man of respectability was on trial for perjury, for swearing falsely 
in relation to the confessions of two of the defendants in one of the fa- 
mous Michigan slave cases. The case of Timberlake, the owner of the 
slaves, against Osborn and others, had been once tried, and the jury 
had disagreed, differing, it was believed, mainly upon the credence to 
be given to the testimony of the person whom they had now procured 



470 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

to be indicted. A case of great intricacy and interest is seldom 
tried. The original causes had been the subject of resolves in the 
Kentucky legislature, and of notice in the halls of Congress. Poli- 
tics had freely mingled in the contest, and every element of excitement 
and stimulant to energy combined to add vigor and determinaiion to 
the prosecution. The government was eminently successful, so far as 
literal testimony went, not only in contradicting the oath of the prison- 
er, pointedly and fully, but also on proving that neither of the parties 
to whom the admissions were imputed had any opportunity to make 
them, and hence that they were impossible. To read the bare oaths of 
the witness for the prosecution it would seem there was no escape for the 
prisoner. It was perceived that the whole defence rested entirely upon 
shaking the credulity of the government witnesses by cross-examination, for 
direct impeachment was impossible. They were all Quakers of the strict- 
est sect, and of good standing in the order. We must pass over the mas- 
terly cross-examination of old Mr. Osborn, which so shook its strength 
as to leave it of little value in the cause. The great reliance of the gov- 
ernment came at last to be upon the testimony of the son. He was 
called first to prove what the person actually swore to on the former 
trial, and then to contradict it by denying, under oath, that he ever 
made the confessions imputed to him by the oath. Owing to certain con- 
cessions of legal principles on a former argument, rather unguardedly 
made by the learned counsel for the government, Mr. E. submitted 
several objections to the competency of this witness growing out of the 
first portions of his evidence. It is unnecessary to particularize them, but 
such was the extraordinary character of the witness's sudden alterations 
of his evidence, to avoid the objections of Air. E., that he not only lost 
all confidence in his integrity, but perceiving his readiness to accommo- 
date his statements to the supposed necessities of the case, he instantly 
conceived one of the boldest schemes to overthrow a dishonest man 
ever witnessed in a court of justice. In order that the almost miracu- 
lous success of the following stratagem may be appreciated, let it be re- 
membered that Mr. Howard, the counsel for the government, drew the 
indictment ; that the portion upon which the scheme was based had 
been a dozen times read during the trial. Counsel, judge, witness and 
jury were all familiar with it. Mr. E. turned to the attorney with 
whom he was associated, and said, •' Don't interrupt me, no matter 
what extraordinary thing I say ; I have no time to explain ;" and suffer- 
ing the witness to proceed for a few moments, he suddenly rose, took 
the indictment from the table, and again objected that the witness 
should not proceed further, as his whole evidence was entirely at war 
with the oath set forth in the record. He commenced with great vehe- 
mence and apparent excitement, as every one supposed, reading from 
the indictment, accompanying his seeming quotations with all proper 
inuendoes and formal statements. Such was the almost mesmeric in- 
fluence of Mr. E.'s violence — at one time talking to the court, then ex- 
postulating with the witness — that no one discovered that the recitation 
of Mr. E. varied most materially from the oath set out in the indictment. 
In order to affect the mind of the witness, and impress him with the 
importance of the testimony, he remarked that the liberty of his client 
rested upon the success of this one objection. He therefore insisted that 



H. H. EMMONS, OF MICHIGAN. 4*71 

unless the witness could say that he remembered clearly and positively 
that the prisoner swore literally just as he (Mr. E.) had read the oath 
from the indictment, that he should not be suflered longer to put in be- 
fore the jury a mass of uncertain and irrelevant evidence. Here, as if 
overcome by his own violence, he paused a moment, and, assuming a 
more subdued and mild demeanor, said, that excited as he had appeared, 
he did not, after all, wish anything more than that the witness should, 
in the first instance, keep his mind on the precipe facts to be sworn to, 
and, without putting the learned counsel to a reply, or the court to a 
decision, he would temporarily withdraw his objection, to see if the wit- 
ness, after all, could, without being led by the counsel for the govern- 
ment, state that he now remembered the oath of the prisoner as he had 
read it in his hearing. With eager readiness the meek thee-and-thou 
man affirmed that he did most positively and clearly remember such 
was the oath of the prisoner. Of course, such was not the oath set out 
in the indictment, or sworn to by the other witnesses for the govern- 
ment. The witness was completely and hopelessly trapped by his own 
dishonest eagerness. By a series of objections, admissions of facts, and 
concessions of law, in relation to what further they wished to show in 
relation to the former evidence of the prisoner, he continued to bear off 
for the time all attention from the record as it really was. On cross- 
examination, the witness was asked if he had always so remembered the 
evidence ; if he had so stated to the counsel for the government before 
the trial ; if, when Mr. H. read him the indictment the night before, he 
recognized the oath, as there set out, without prompting or leading, and 
a series of similar questions, which will readily suggest themselves to 
the mind ; to all of which, with great readiness, the witness answered in 
the affirmative. He said that he had always so remembered it, using 
various forms of strong expression to impress the jury with the clear- 
ness of his memory; until when, in the final summing up, it was shown 
that the indictment had been misread, and the witness swearing to false- 
hoods by the wholesale. There was no attempt whatever to protect 
him by the prosecuting attorney. He was abandoned as the victim of 
his own eagerness, and one of the most bold, masterly conducted, and 
almost incredible stratagems ever witnessed in court. The only conso- 
lation the attorney for the government had, was to condemn, in severe 
terras, the practice by which his witness had been tempted and de- 
stroyed. 

The jury stood nine for acquittal and three for conviction. Though 
upon those technical rules upon which the weight of evidence depends 
the prisoner should have been acquitted, yet there was, after all, in the 
successful indirect impeachment of the witnesses of the government, an 
inherent improbability in the prisoner's oath which stung his defence 
to the quick, and by which, but for the extraordinary course which stripped 
of all legal force the testimony against him, he must inevitably have 
been convicted. The case has never been tried again, and in all proba- 
bility never will be. 

The peculiar structure of the indictment and the course of the cause — 
certain accidental occurrences which, by a strange and unusual combina- 
tion, suggested the possibility of such an achievement to Mr. E., are toO' 
complicated, and give too tedious a detail for insertion. That they 



472 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

should have been thus suddenly seized, and instantaneously woven with 
so deceptive and successful a delusion as to lead astray a whole jury, 
two learned opposing counsel, a really able, old, and experienced judge, 
and a witness who came fully trained upon the stand, first from a care- 
ful reading of the indictment as it actually was, proves the possession 
of personal power, and an ability instantaneously to seize upon the ac- 
cidents of a trial, and wield them to a client's advantage, which few men 
possess in the same degree. 

In the early part of the trial of a case of much pecuniary importance 
and general interest, some warm words fell from the plaintiff's counsel. 
Mr. E. was highly excited, but, as in later years he has eminently suc- 
ceeded in doing, continued to resist its manifestation. He resolved, 
however, to reward, during the trial, his professional opponent, who, 
though a man of high standing at the bar, a powerful advocate, of high 
literary attainments and general powers, was but ill matched with Mr. 
E. in the trial of a long, technical, and difficult cause. He hit upon a 
plan, novel indeed, in which to effect the punishment of his opponent — 
one which never could have occurred to a man not more than ordinarily 
familiar with all the rules of evidence, the whole law applicable to the 
case on trial, and the practice of the court. 

Having discovered from the course thus far of his opponent that he 
entirely misconceived several important rules of evidence, and in one 
respect the general law of the case, he deemed it almost certain that he 
might suffer him to go through his cause, and so far as Mr. E. pleased 
he could put in his own defence, and that he could then, upon merely 
technical grounds, quite aside from the merits, compel him to submit to 
a nonsuit after he had summed up to the jury. In ordinary cases such 
a victory would be profitless, as another action might be brought ; but 
in this case the defence was but half prepared, some of the jury were 
suspected, and Mr. E. felt fully authorized to obtain the permission of 
his client to the course he adopted, by which he would hear fully the 
plaintiff's case, go far enough to call out his argument before the jury, 
and then nonsuit him. To do this in the manner most mortifying to his 
opponent was the object. He also resolved to obtain against him as 
great a number of rulings as possible on questions arising during the 
trial, and then, in one well- arranged digest of errors, present all in a 
series to the court and jury. This somewhat laborious and novel plan 
he most triumphantly executed. 

The trial lasted some ten days, during which, by frequently making 
an offer to prove certain facts in a doubtful and hesitating mode, he 
elicited an objection from his adversary which was promptly overruled 
by the court. These ran up to twenty-seven in number. Although the 
plan was to suffer plaintiffs' counsel to sum up fully, and then to follow 
him with a severe expose of his want of technical learnings the cause 
had lasted so long, and Mr. Emmons' engagements positively demanded 
him elsewhere, that after suffering a part of the speech of plaintiff's 
counsel to be delivered, the first distant allusion he made to the amount 
to be recovered, Mr. Emmons called him to order upon the ground that 
there was no evidence of the amount of damages competent for the con- 
sideration of the jury. The learned judge readily ruled, on having his 
attention drawn to the law applicable to the case, that out of some 



H. H. EMMONS, OP MICHIGAN. 4*73 

$6,000 claimed, there was only the inconsiderable sum ct' about sixty 
dollars so proven, that he could suffer in relation to it any comment to 
the jury. This was the more mortifying to counsel, as he perceived at 
once that it was all along designed by Mr, Emmons. He remembered 
that the subject had been with apparent indifference passed by the 
defence, subject to such objections as they chose before the close of the 
case to make. He had most injudiciously passed on in his cause, over 
confident in himself, and regardless of his experienced and adroit adver 
sary. 

The court was asked for a few hours' adjournment, in order that the 
plaintiff's counsel might elect what course to pursue, as the objection was 
unexpected and therefore unprepared for. Mr. Emmons, with provok- 
ing and most complacent liberality, seconded his opponent's request, 
assuring the court that this one passed, other impediments still more 
difficult lay in the plaintiff's pathway to a verdict. 

The plaintiff at the adjourned hour came into court and submitted to 
a nonsuit. 

Another suit for the same cause was never commenced, and the re- 
sult was a defence of his client from a large and really dangerous claim. 

The rebuke was probably as mortifying and complete as ever an 
offended lawyer gave another. It was, too, administered in a way of 
which there could be no complaint without a pre-admission of profes- 
sional inferiority. Such an one was not likely to be put forth. 

He was once retained as counsel to defend a cause of great local 
interest, prosecuted by the administrators of one deceased brother 
against the estate of another. The plaintiff's estate was very wealthy, 
that of defendant barely sufficient to sustain with comfort the widow, 
and give small portions to a numerous family of children. The suit 
was upon a note of some §6,000. the payment upon which would sweep 
the entire property of the defending family. The defence which had 
theretofore been relied upon, was that the consideration cf the note was 
fraudulent, in that the elder and more wealthy brother, who first came 
from Scotland to this country, had sent word to the intestate of the de- 
fendant, that if he would come to America and settle, he would buy 
him a farm. This it was contended made the elder brother an agent, 
and that he was in the law bound to give the other the farm at 
the same price for which he purchased it, and inasmuch as he had 
included in this note several thousand dollars of profit it was to this 
extent void, being a gain made by the agent out of his principal's con- 
tract. Mr. Emmons saw at a glance the fallacy of such a defence. It 
was an agency, if any, concerning real estate. No money was advanced 
by his client's intestate, no promise was made to take the farm when 
bought, or the slightest evidence that the land in question was bought 
for the purpose of this particular sale. All the great leading elements of 
a legal agency were wanting. There was beside no certainty that they 
could make it appear that the price of the farm constituted a part of the 
consideration of the note, which bore date years after the sale. At best 
it was to be left to the jury upon circumstantial evidence. 

The unconscionable price moreover for which the farm sold was 
perhaps quite as much dependent upon the temporary mania as to 
the price of real estate, as to any really hard-hearted overreaching on 



474 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

the part of the elder and wealthy brother. And although the enforce- 
ment of the claim would have been hard and even cruelly unjust, and 
the case was one calculated not only to justify but to stimulate to the 
utmost the energy of a lawyer in saving all he possibly could for his 
client, still it fell so far short of a legal fraud, either at law or in 
equity, that Mr. Emmons knew well the learning and experience of his 
Honor Judge Whipple, before whom the cause was tried, would beyond 
doubt discover the weakness of the defence, and in leaving the cause to 
the jury tell them the plaintiff was entitled to recover. 

In these circumstances he saw the only hope ultimately for his client 
consisted in a settlement. To eflect this advantageously was the sole 
object of his exertions. He took to his hotel the eldest son of his 
widowed client, a young man of integrity and real intelligence, and fully 
explaining to him the fallacy and hopelessness of the pretended defence, 
obtained from him such terms as the family would consider just and 
satisfactory for a compromise. He instructed him to make no commu- 
nication to any one, to be in constant attendance with his witnesses 
that the cause would proceed with all possible energy and apparent 
confidence of success, but that the first favorable opportunity would 
be seized to secure a settlement upon the best terms which could be pro- 
cured. The occasion watched for by Mr. Emmons was one of those 
temporary flashes of triumph on the one side, and dejection on the 
other, which so frequently attend the trial of long and spiritedly con- 
tested causes when the respective legal rights are not thoroughly and 
definitely understood. Fortune threw into the cause the precise inci- 
dent he wanted. 

To the successful accomplishment of Mr. Emmons' plan he deemed 
it of great importance to secure the right to begin and close the case to 
the jury. This he did by admitting vt, prima fade cause of action for 
the plaintiff, assuming the burden of showing the note was fraudulent 
and void. His application for this privilege was entirely novel at that 
time at the Oakland bar, and the tnotion was therefore received with 
much mirth and ridicule by the plaintiff's attorney and counsel, and 
when readily granted by the learned presiding judge, they were corres- 
pondingly disappointed. This, as he anticipated, greatly aided his hope 
of a compromise, and he proceeded to make the most of the advantage 
thus obtained. A careful and guarded opening was made, in which the 
details of the evidence to show agency were wholly omitted, but abun- 
dant citations of books and authorities, to show that it was a fraud for 
an agent to speculate upon the contract of his principal, were read and 
commented on at length. That there was an agency was adroitly as- 
sumed, and proceeding at once to the only point at which it was con- 
ceded any difficulty was anticipated, that of proving that the note in 
question was really given in part payment for the land — the facts and 
circumstances from which this was to appear were fully explained in ad- 
vance. The effort was so happy on the jury and bystanders, and it was 
believed, upon the court and opposing party, that Mr. Emmons at one 
time believed this early stage in the cause sufficiently propitious 
to warrant his attempt at settlement. An accidental diflficulty between 
the parties however prevented his eflTorts then, and the defence proceeded 
in the usual manner. It gave rise to numerous questions of competency 



H. H. EMMONS, OF MICHIGAN. 475 

and relevancy, in which Mr. Emmons was careful in the extreme not to 
get a ruling against himself; yielding every thing of doubt, and 
when he possibly could, inviting an objection from his opponents when 
he was sure it would be overruled. The papers of the estate had never 
been examined by the defendant's attorneys. Among them Mr. Em- 
mons caused a faithful examination to be made, as the cause progressed, 
until, in the evening of the fourth day, and after a great number of wit- 
nesses had been sworn, to prove the consideration of the note, a written 
settlement, signed by the parties, and showing beyond all controversy 
the very fact they had been laboring by so many witnesses to establish, 
was discovered. It was found at a fortunate time, when a long and 
spirited argument was going on in relation to the competency of some 
offered evidence. The next morning this argument was suffered for 
some time to proceed, that the audience might collect, the excitement 
of the opposing counsel to come again up to its maximum, when Mr. 
Emmons, as if he had been unwillingly detained, came hastening into 
court with a paper in his hand, and begged his associate counsel, who 
was addressing the court, to yield him the floor for a moment. This, of 
course, as had been arranged, was readily done. Mr. Emmons then re- 
marked that they owed an apology to the court and jury for the days 
they had uselessly spent in endeavoring to defend against an unjust 
claim, by such tedious and indirect modes as their ignorance of their 
own cause compelled them to adopt. He was now happy to inform 
them that the cause would soon close on their part ; tliat they had 
at length found amongst the papers of the estate the written admission 
of the"plaintifl"'s intestate of the very fact which had been for so many 
days denied before the jury ; he therefore withdrew the offered evidence to 
which his opponents were objecting, and all the other evidence in the case 
which the plaintiffs did not desire should remain before the jury. The 
paper which he held in his hand was all the defendants needed to secure 
a verdict. This announcement was received with sensible manifesta- 
tions of good-will in the crowded auditory. He suggested, as the case 
had taken so sudden a turn, as the defendants were so unexpectedly re- 
lieved from several days' farther examination of witnesses upon this con- 
tested point, that the court take a recess for an hour that the defence 
might conclude what additional proofs it was necessary to put in ; that 
to proceed then would quite probably but use the time of the court in 
that which with some reflection might be deemed unnecessary. To this 
there was no objection, as the other party seemed really annoyed and 
surprised by the sudden production of the paper. Without sitting 
down, and before adjournment, Mr. Emmons took the plaintiff by 
the arm, and walking down the centre aisle to the far end of the court- 
room, in a tone of high confidence and decision, said to him : " You 
know I am the counsel of the defendants, and I want you to make no 
reply to what I say, but desire simply that you will report it to your 
counsel, as you will of course follow their advice. I am instructed by my 
client to say that she desires this controversy to be settled wholly irre- 
spective of any legal advantage which might be obtained on the trial of 
this cause. I am authorized now, notwithstanding the certainty of our 
defence, to offer a compromise, leaving to the estimate of indifferent men 
the true value of the farm when her husband bought it. What is due 



476 ' SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

shall be immediately paid in land by appraisement." The plaintiff 
readily replied that he knew his own business, did not want to see his 
counsel, that he had never been aslted to settle until now, and was ready 
at once to close with the offer. Mr. Emmons refused to consider it 
settled till approbated by the plaintiff 's counsel. This was but a mat- 
ter of form, for before the forms of the adjournment were concluded the 
settlement was acceded to by all the counsel, and the court by both par- 
ties asked to adjourn till after dinner. At that time the account had 
been settled, the deeds executed, and whether substantially or formally 
only, the writer knows not, but the large families of contending cousins 
had shaken hands in token of reconciliation. The defendants were saved 
a handsome fortune, and the plaintiff got all which in justice was due, 
or which they in mercy could have taken. 

It is evident that with great legal experience opposed to him, such a 
plan could not have been executed, but the opponents of Mr. Emmons 
though never of large practice, were esteemed good lawyers ; indeed, 
leaders in their county. The judge upon the bench was learned and 
experienced, and the successful accomplishment of such a plan evinces 
a high degree of talent and address, as well as legal acuteness and in- 
dustry, on the part of counsel. The skill consisted in adroitly keeping 
back out of the way of discussion the really weak points in his case, 
and offering a settlement in the only moment when perhaps it would 
have been accepted. Fortunate accidents sometimes occur which much 
resemble this arrangement. But this was all arranged and fully antici- 
pated, and had not this lucky paper turned up, a complicated, and what 
we venture to say a successful plan had been arranged to produce on the 
following day similar results. 

Instances of equal interest and success could be multiplied from the 
extensive trial lists of Mr. Emmons. These are given only as a sam- 
ple of the energy, the devotion and force with which he tries a cause. 

When on the defence, judges are many times annoyed by the clear- 
ness with which an error appears in the bill of exceptions, which they 
would by no means have committed had the matter been as fully de- 
veloped on trial as it is made to appear in the record. Many times it 
will appear that a far better defence can be made on another trial, and 
his success in suffering a verdict subject to fatal exceptions is unparal- 
leled. In such an experiment he never failed. 

The stamp of authority has no influence on the judgment or the fear- 
less expression of Mr. Emmons' opinions. The following is but one 
instance out. of hundreds illustrative of his criticisms. 

In 1842, the Supreme Court of the United States adopted rules for 
practice in equity for the several circuit courts under an act of Congress. 
Soon after some questions arose under them in the Michigan circuit. 
Mr. Emmons took occasion to criticise them with the greatest severity. 
He analyzed and showed the absurdity of several rules which subse- 
quent experience has compelled the court which so injudiciously adopted 
them to repeal. About this time the Supreme Court of the state ap- 
pointed a committee to adopt rules for practice in equity, and the com 
mittee reported and the court adopted several of the innovations from 
the rules of the United States courts. Mr, Emmons, without consulta- 
tion with any one, or giving any intimation of his rather novel motion, 



H. H. EMMONS, OF MICHIGAK. 477 

moved the court in banc, for an order appointing a new committee which 
should point out the objects to be obtained and the evils to be remedied 
by the new rules ; that all was incomprehensible to the bar except 
their annoyance and inconvenience. Some gentlemen of the bar most 
promptly and patronizingly replied that they were taken, word for word, 
from the rules of the Supreme Court of the United States, assuming 
that the high source of their origin would be a most satisfactory as- 
surance of their propriety. "Yes," said Mr. Emmons, "I was aware they 
had a similar absurdity in that court, and have long experienced the 
vexatious inconveniencies of complying with their requirements. Thai 
we have fellow-sufferers in other courts by no means inclines me to 
withdraw my motion. I would still press for the committee, if it 
pleases your honors." The rules, it seems, had already attracted the at- 
tention of the learned judges at the circuits, and the chief justice good 
naturedly replied that the court would appoint Mr. Emmons sole com- 
mittee, of which he would of course be chairman, to draft an order re- 
scinding the rules complained of 

In the early practice of Mr. Emmons, he obtained a very large num- 
ber of criminal defences, and among the number was that of a somewhat 
celebrated offender who for many years sustained a high reputation in 
his county and managed large amounts of property with great apparent 
prosperity and business success. But he was arrested successively for 
arson, smuggling, forgery, bribing jurors, assault and battery, with intent 
to commit rape, for stealing and harboring felons and receiving stolen 
horses, and was almost universally considered as one of the leaders of 
a desperate band of offenders, who terrified by their depredations the 
whole community. This man, when his standing was generally good, 
retained Mr. Emmons in his defence. He was considered by most men 
then, and especially by his counsel, a persecuted man. His defence in 
many successive trials was successful. But other arrests and indict- 
ments still followed, and though by a series of the most pains-taking 
and adroit defences, he was cleared upon some six or eight different 
trials, and actually recovered verdicts against leading citizens who had 
published him as a dangerous man and a villain, still so clear at last 
did his guilt in some matters appear to Mr. Emmons, and so repugnant 
to his better feelings were these efficient and zealous labors for those 
whom he more than suspected, and knowing that he could do nothing 
by halves, he resolved wholly to abandon the defence of criminals. He 
found the name of his firm upon the defence of every indictment which 
stood for trial in the criminal court but two, during a long and active 
term. He had it stricken from every case but one, and from that time 
to this he has not appeared as attorney in a single criminal case, and 
but in three or four instances has he acted as counsel. His explanation 
is that the ardor of his temperament and the habits of his professional 
life were constantly urging him up to, if not over, what he deemed the 
line of duty in favor of a criminal. Believing there were enough, who 
from choice would defend all who deserved it, he did not deem it a 
duty to continue a practice which was distasteful. This sudden and 
marked abandonment of a large and lucrative branch of business we 
deem high evidence of a nice sense of honor and love of principle. 

In 1843 Mr. E. was left alone in business by the death of his father, 



4 78 BKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

and he continued thud to practice until his present accomplished partner, 
Joseph A. Van Dyke, Esq., offered him, in 1844, a connection, which, 
owing to his growing taste for study, and dislike of the details of busi- 
ness, he accepted. The result of this connection was to remove Mr. E. 
somewhat from the ordinary litigations in court. The union of his own 
large, miscellaneous business with that of Mr. V. D., threw into his 
hands a mass of chancery practice and business in the higher courts, 
which from that time forward has kept him constantly in his library, and 
compelled him to devote his entire time to professional study. His part- 
ner being a successful jury advocate, of great shrewdness, and a good 
lawyer, all the ordinary trials, when clients did not insist upon the pre- 
sence of Mr. E., were conducted by the former. The legal investiga- 
tions, however, if difficult and doubtful, were made by Mr. E. It was 
quite common for him to seat himself at the trial, listen to his partner's 
opening, the cross-examination of the first witness by the opposing coun- 
sel, or hear the plaintiff's opening, if his firm was on the defensive, and 
when he had ascertained that it was highly probable the true points in 
the case had been fully anticipated, and that his partner was in posses- 
sion of them all, return to the pursuit of those extensive and exhausting 
investigations in which for the last eight years he has been constantly 
engaged. At the bar of the circuit and before juries, therefore, he has 
been seen far less than his showy and active partner, who, as an advo- 
cate, I think stands at the head of the Michigan bar. It seldom happens 
that two such men are united in business as Joseph A. Van Dyke and 
H. H. Emmons. Together, they seem to embody all the requisites of 
a masterly, perfect prosecution and defence. If I were obliged to part 
with either in a great cause, of course the technical learning of Mr. E. 
could with less safety be spared ; and at the period when he volunta- 
rily withdrew from the more showy departments of jury advocacy, he 
commanded a much larger practice there than his partner ; but this, I 
apprehend, was not owing to the fact that he excelled or even equaled 
him in mere declamatory powers ; but for the union of high legal attain- 
ments, with powers as an advocate of no ordinary kind, and as a 
clear, simple, illustrative reasoner, an acute examiner, argus watchful- 
ness of every point in the cause, he was ever signally distinguished. 
The association of such a man as Mr. Van Dyke, and the absence of all 
ambition on the part of Mr. E. for fame elsewhere than before the chan- 
cellor, the federal judges, and the court of last resort in his own state, 
has most materially affected the character of his practice and reputation. 
The frequent and indeed almost constant efforts of a popular kind, made 
in his earlier practice, won him high reputation as an advocate and a 
successful manager. A few years since nearly all the original business 
of the state was turned into a new tribunal (now fortunately abolished) 
called the county court, and so fully had Mr. E. withdrawn from the 
miscellaneous business of his firm, that during its three years' existence 
he tried but three causes in it. One of these was a very celebrated 
cause, lasting some thirty-one days in the trial, and raising a question of 
title to the immense estate held by the Catholic Bishop of Michigan. 
In the United States Court his jury practice has been more extensive. 
But it is not as a man of eloquence, of great persuasive powers, or as a 
man of popular influence, that he is deserving of notice, or his course 



H. H. EMMONS, OF MICHIGAN. 479 

deemed worthy of imitation, but as a lawyer strictly ; as a successful 
reasoner, because he studies and prepares his reasons ; as a man 
eminently read}' in reply, because he is deeply versed in the principles 
which his opponent has mistaken ; who surprises his adversary by a won- 
derful foresight and far-reaching calculation of effects, not by any extra- 
ordinary natural gift or peculiar conformation of mind, but by a perfect 
familiarity with every fact he will himself put in evidence, and, far 
oftener than the contrary, by being more familiar with what his oppo- 
nent's testimony will legally sustain than that opponent himself Mr. 
E. rejects the idea of genius for the profession, and claims that the great 
line of distinction is drawn in its ranks by indolence on the one hand, 
and activity on the other. 

In the court of last resort of the state, Mr. E. has delivered a long list 
of masterly arguments. They are never superficial — such an argument 
he never made. When asked to aid in discussions involving principles 
with which he is not familiar, his reply is, he does not like lecturing be- 
fore an audience knowing just as much of the subject as himself. In- 
deed, without preparation immediately for the occasion, or previous 
general familiarity with the question, he never speaks in court, unless 
forced to do so by the accidents of a trial. He never harangues, re- 
peats, or wanders. Though he is minute, and, beyond doubt, sometimes 
unnecessarily protractive, one moment's time is never spent in discussing 
irrelevant doctrines. The bench has never to say, " we do not see the 
application." It is ever clear, and receives at his hands an actual appli- 
cation. The memoranda from which he speaks is unusually full, having 
kept up the habits of his early years, to which we have referred. He 
sometimes offers the bench the choice of a copy of his own full notations, 
or simply his propositions and authorities. The judges have never been 
known to choose the latter. Too much labor is saved by an accurate 
and learned analysis of a long and complicated case, cited to the support 
of a principle which it only inferentially supports, for any man to reject 
its aid, and voluntarily assume the labor of examination anew ; and 
whether the point is positively decided, whether the case shakes some 
reason only upon which a hostile decision was grounded, or is of still 
lower power in argument, being merely one whose facts might have jus- 
tified, but in which eminent counsel did not raise the point relied on by 
his adversary, or whatever use is sought to be made of a citation, that 
use is, in plain and unmistakable terms, fully declared. It rarely happens 
that a case is cited against Mr. E. in an appellate court, or any other 
where the point has been anticipated, with which he is not entirely fami- 
liar. Nor does he ever, as is too frequently the case, affect to recall it 
from the great storehouse of his general reading, if it has had in reality 
a recent examination, but, sitting at the bar with his brief of " cases 
contra" in his hands, adds to his already labored-written review which 
it contains, such suggestions as the comments of counsel cause to occur. 
In this list of cases contra are noted all the strongest grounds against 
himself which he deems tenable from the citations, with replies and re- 
ferences to his brief for the court. Thus armed, he is ever readi/ in re- 
pli/, as it is termed, because ready when he entered court. 

Mr. E. is not, in the ordinary sense of the term, a party politician ; 
and yet the common judgment of his opponents is that he is among the 



480 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

most ardent and uncompromising whigs in his state. He never solicits 
office for himself or others — seeks no prominence or influence in his 
party. He never attends caucus nominations, or interferes in the man- 
agement of its general affairs ; and yet, when particular issues excite his 
interest, no man is more zealous or efficient. He takes the field of pub- 
lic argument with the same indefatigable application with which he tries 
a cause. If he deems particular measures of action expedient they are 
proposed, forced through, and consummated, just as he would execute a 
plan in court, or in the ordinary affairs of life. There is no halting for 
forms — no awaiting for other meti's conclusions, approbation, or assist- 
ance ; but the proposition is made, and its execution entered upon with 
a directness and promptness which show that the scheme has bee« ma- 
tured in his own mind before his proposition, and its success generally 
demonstrates its justness and propriety. And this peculiarity by no 
means attends his.political action alone. In every field of public labor 
in which he acts at all, the same definite action and directness of princi- 
ple mark his course. 

A few illustrations out of many will illustrate this striking peculiarity 
in his political, moral, and benevolent exertions. 

Some few years since, one of those extraordinary and sudden changes 
from heat to cold which characterize the Michigan winter, and send 
misery and suffering to the needy and fireless homes of the unclad, ill- 
sheltered poor, aroused the attention of Mr. E. to their probable condi- 
tion. On retiring for the night to his own well-warmed and comfortable 
room, he remarked to his wife, that the sudden appearance of such intense 
cold succeeding many weeks of uninterrupted warm weather could not 
but find the needy wholly unprepared for its severity. At that time, no 
plank roads led into the country, and so nearly impassable, by continu- 
ous rains, had the roads become, that wood, then the sole fuel used in 
the city, had arisen from $1 75 to S5 and $6 per cord. It was, indeed, 
entirely beyond the reach of the poor, and they must be relieved 
promptly, immediately, or actually freeze. It was just the emergency 
demanding the prompt energy of the man who assumed the duty of 
their relief. Early the following morning, immediately after a break- 
fast taken before daylight, Mr. E. was on the move. He did not wait 
for consultation or advice as to the best mode. He resolved forthwith, 
and within an hour, to have the citizens together, and, in the next, to 
see the cars in motion distributing fuel to the suffering. The first man 
he met in the cit}' he accosted thus : " Are you around notifying ?" 
"Notifying what?" replied the citizen. "The meeting at the United 
States court-room, to take measures immediately to distribute wood to 
the poor," said Mr. E. " It takes place at nine, and, without instant 
relief, death will, beyond all doubt, occur." "I had not heard of it," 
replied the citizen, " but will most gladly do what I can." "Very good," 
said Mr. E. " Suppose you notify those on your street immediately, 
and hasten all you see along to the court-house." Thus he served the 
next, and each succeeding man he met, engaging, in the work of notifica- 
tion and in spreading the excitement, (for such it really became,) every 
one whom he deemed efficient and earnest. Never, in so short a time, 
were so great a number of earnest men called together, save by the fire- 
bell at midnight. The crying necessity of the case touched each man's 



H. H. EMMONS, OF MICHIGAN, 481 

heart. Mr. E. says, in an hour, he heard twenty times the hearty res- 
ponse, " That's right ; I was just thinking of that myself," The court- 
room was filled to overflowing. Thousands were subscribed in less 
than an hour, and the immense piles in the wood-yard of the Michigan 
Central Rail-road were thrown open, at cost price, to the committee of 
the people. Within less than ninety minutes from the time when the 
first man was asked if he was " around notifying," proclamation was 
made, hundreds of poor men, women and children were seen with wood 
in their arms, issuing from the gates of the company, all eagerly pressing 
homeward to kindle a fire upon the family hearth. The fund raised 
was more than double what was needed, and it was invested for future 
use, and subsequently sent comfort to the homes of many a needy suf- 
ferer. The meeting itself was a mystery. No one knew who called 
it, and when noticed, as it was most extensively, in the newspapers of 
the whole country, it was spoken of as the spontaneous gathering of 
the people of Detroit to relieve the poor. The writer of this knew, 
about the time of the occurrence, the cause of the gathering, but beyond 
two or three, none ever knew the origin of the much celebrated "wood 
donation' to the poor." 

Mr. E. was on no committee. In the published proceedings inserted 
in the city papers, with all the parade which the great benevolence and 
extraordinary success of the movement merited, his name in no way 
appeared. It is but an illustration of his whole life. He has never 
been known to seek a public place of the most inconsiderable kind. 

We have said that he was celebrated for the fearless and independ- 
ent stand which, regardless of personal consequences, he so frequently 
took in relation to public and popular questions. Some years ago, 
when Irish repeal associations were popular, Mr. E. and a few tempe- 
rance friends started, as an adjunct and aid to their abstinence move- 
ments, a repeal association. It was first small and obscure. It soon, 
however, attracted the attention of the politicians. It grew to a large 
popular gathering, when it was useful and common for demagogues 
to utter sentiments wholly at war with the principles and constitution 
of the association. Mr. E. appeared there but little after it assumed its 
more popular form, until, on an occasion of great excitement, the whole 
Irish population of the city had gathered to pass censure upon the Rev. 
Dr. Duffield, a learned, widely-known and highly-esteemed Presbyte- 
rian clergyman, who, in one of a series of lectures which he was deliv- 
ering to his congregation against Catholicism, was supposed to have 
said something derogatory to the character of the Irish nation generally, 
and the repeal association in particular. The meeting was among the 
largest and most excited ever convened in the city. The Rev. Catholic 
bishop of the diocese, and several learned and talented priests, were 
among the presiding officers of the evening, and numerous inflammatory 
speeches and denunciatory resolutions had been introduced, when, 
somewhat late in the evening, Mr. E. came forward, and, in one of the 
boldest and most masterly arguments to which it has ever been my 
privilege to listen, defended the right of an American Protestant cler- 
gyman to preach against Catholicism, Irish repeal, temperance, or se 
cret societies, or whatever he conscientiously believed to be injurious to 

31 



482 6KETCHBS OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

the welfare, temporal or eternal, of his fellow-citizens. It would leacl to 
unpardonable prolixity to follow the ingenious argument by which he 
committed his audience enthusiastically and with repeated plaudits to 
certain abstract propositions, beautifully and pathetically illustrated by 
a simple story which went right to the heart of an Irishman, and which, 
by an application clear and irresistible, compelled the immense au- 
dience before him, without one dissenting voice, to reject the whole 
mass of censorious resolutions, and adopt, with acclamation, a mild, 
courteous resolve, referring to Dr. D., in terms of great respect, accord- 
ing fully the right of discussion and opinion, but simply asserting his 
mistake of certain facts, and pointing out the pardonable and natural 
cause of his error. A clergyman present pronounced it the greatest tri- 
umph he ever witnessed over the excitements, the prejudices and pas- 
sions of a public audience. Mr. E. subsequently received the formal 
thanks of many leading citizens for his fearless and powerful effort. 
Before it was made, his proposed resolution was read to an Irish friend ; 
he said to Mr. E., " You can do much, undoubtedly, with this audience, 
they will hear from you what they would not from very many ; but I 
fear you are attempting too much." But the very boldness of the 
thing controlled those uncultivated but really generous hearts, whose 
noble impulses might be successfully appealed to a thousand times 
more frequently than they are, with far greater success and power, than 
attends the low arts of the demagogue and the flatterer. 

In the cause of temperance, he has ever been a leading and influential 
man. His uncompromising stand on this subject has made him some 
bitter opposers, and given his attitude, in his own city, sometimes a 
false appearance of unpopularity. No man of his age, however, stands 
better, more strongly with the vast majority of the citizens of his city 
and state. But there are certain noisy classes, the pot-house politicians, 
and the demagogue leaders, who have no peculiar attachment to the 
man who lashes their habits and never courts their good opinion. 

Mr. E. has for several years frequently spoken in public upon the 
impolicy of associating the idea of revenue with the sale of ardent spi- 
rits. He was always in favor of a prohibitory law, and claims that the 
first step towards this was to place the traffic in alcoholic drinks, in the 
first instance, upon the same basis as all other commodities. While 
the state convention, to revise the constitution of Michigan, was in ses- 
sion, numerous petitions were presented to the body, praying the adop- 
tion of a clause totally prohibiting the sale of ardent spirits in the state. 
These were presented to Mr. E. for signature, but deeming the mea- 
sure wholly impracticable, that so much was asked, that nothing would 
be obtained, he refused to place his name among the petitioners. To 
the surprise of the great masses of the people, there was found in the 
new constitution a prohibition of the entire old-fashioned license sys- 
tem ; the hobby of Mr. E., as it had been termed, was actually a part of 
the fundamental law, a constitutional provision of the state. No public 
meeting had been called, he had not figured as president, or committee- 
man in any public body. The newspapers had not sent his name 
abroad as a noisy agitator for the doctrine ; and yet it would be idle to 
impute to any one else, than the only man who ever publicly advocated 



H. H. EMMONS, OF MICHIGAN, 483 

the doctrine before the meeting of the convention, and who corres- 
ponded actively on the subject during its sitting, the enactment of the 
clause. 

The meaning of the provision, the extent of its effect in cities and in- 
corporated villages, came before the Supreme Court of the state at the 
January term, 1852. And the court, beside delivering an opinion upon 
the only really necessary point in the case, at the strong solicitation 
of counsel, the judges intimated the inclination of their minds on seve- 
ral questions which had been discussed on the argument. The result 
was a pretty free expression of opinion, both on the bench, and by way 
of inquiry and explanations also at the bar. Several remarked that the 
general object of the provision was utterly incomprehensible ; that it 
opened the sale to all, and so could not have emanated from temperance 
men; that it prohibited all revenue, and consequently could not have 
been asked by the tax-payers. It was pronounced the very acme of 
folly and absurdity. Mr. Emmons, after having patiently listened to all 
who seemed to have anything to say, rose and said that he would relieve 
the minds of learned gentlemen from the truly distressing perplexity in 
which they seemed laboring ; that he could not speak of course for a 
majority of the convention, but for those who drew the provision and 
originated its introduction, he could speak with absolute certainty. It 
was fully anticipated that its first and immediate effect would be an in- 
jurious one, by increasing that which all admitted to be the great lead- 
ing curse of the country, the traffic in alcoholic drinks But it had been 
found by experience that every application to the legislature for a totally 
prohibitory law had been defeated by the pot-house politicians, by those 
little locally great men of the cities and villages, a large portion of 
whose petty revenues were derived from the power to regulate inns 
and groceries. That while the delusion of taxation, the monstrous 
absurdity of the community being paid for the privilege of destroying 
its members, remained, it was utterly impossible to reach the mayors 
and aldermen of the cities and the boards of the villages. The loss of 
the revenue was an unanswerable motive for their action, if not an 
argument in their mouths ; and afler the most careful and solemn deli- 
beration, believing that the very best thing had been done for the ulti- 
mate good of the state, a few leading and thoughtful friends of temper- 
ance concluded it was the best to ask for, and the convention in its 
liberality and good sense had concluded to insert, a provision which 
would leave the evils or benefits of selling rum, gin, and brandy naked 
ly exposed to the judgment of the people. If the public good really 
required the sale there was no reason under Heaven why a man should 
pay for the liberty of selling it any more than for that of disposing of 
bread and of beef If it were an unmitigated wrong, then it was mon- 
strous to suffer under the sanction of law any mar for money to com- 
mit the crime. It has been thought best to leave the rum traffic 
to stand or fall by its own merits. The decision of the bench accords 
exactly with the actual motives of the provision. It was simply to 
sever the spirit traffic from revenue. "And, gentlemen," said he, turn- 
ing round to the auditory, " the trade and society are before you ; per- 
petuate the former to the injury of the latter just as long as you please, 
but you can no longer add insult to the infliction by telling us that we 



484 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

are paid for our suffering and our shame. My own opinion is, that the 
insertion of that wise provision is one of the longest strides towards 
a total prohibition of the spirit traffic which has ever been taken in the 
State of Michigan. This was the sole motive of those who asked for it. 
If the provision still appears absurd, at least, gentlemen, its motives will 
no longer remain mysterious and incomprehensible." 

But this extended notice must be brought to a close. The great dif- 
ficulty has been to select from the great mass of materials which the active 
and impulsive life of Mr. Emmons affords for the writer. Few men are 
more felt in society. Few have succeeded more extensively in impress- 
mg upon it, and the laws and institutions, judicial, political, moral, and 
benevolent of his state their own peculiar opinions and theories, and his 
name nowhere appears. There is but one class of men for the last 
quarter of a century who figure in American history. The party poli- 
tician, the dominant party politician alone is mentioned. His doings, 
sayings, and theories are chronicled. He may be but yielding to the 
mightv influences which bold, energetic reformers have set in action. 
But enacting into laws the great theories and recommendations which 
the discussions of the bar and the bench have originated and matured, 
and his name alone is known beyond the precincts of his state. Gover- 
nor A., Senator B., and Gjmgressmen C, D. and E., standing for the 
time being as the governmental body through which the soul and active 
impulse of society are manifesting its thoughts and emotions, are 
heralded abroad as its great men ; while the very life of the state's 
prosperity, all which gives it intellectual character and sustains its high 
position as a powerful and prosperous commonwealth among the nations 
of the earth; her leading, active, honest and influential professional 
men, giant commercial managers, find no place in public records or 
prints. Our newspapers but seldom report a learned, eloquent, 
and masterly argument at the bar, though it may touch a thousand 
practical rights which lay close beside the hearthstone, the freehold, 
and the character. But the most pitiful ebullitions of the political 
demagogue are hawked about in our party papers as if the salvation 
of the nation rested upon their perusal. 

As for fortune, Mr. Emmons has not, and unless he greatly changes 
his expensive habits, he never will become a very wealthy man. He 
does not know what economy is when the comfort and enjoyment of 
his family are concerned. In personal enjoyments aside from his home 
he expends nothing. But his home is spacious and even elegant. His 
residence is among the best in the city in vvhich he resides. In the ex- 
tent and elegance of his grounds, the costliness of their decorations, they 
surpass any in the city and equal any in the state. These things for a 
younor man who twelve vears ago started without a dollar, are whollv 
incompatible with great wealth; still Mr. Emmons is entirely independ- 
ent, has a fortune between thirty and forty thousand dollars. He says 
he has no desire to leave his wife and little ones with any more than to 
enable them with economy to live respectably. He does not desire 
them to be enabled to dispense with the one, or in style exceed 
the modest limits of the other. 

His style of living is plain and democratic, and his whole family are 
characterized for sentiments and practices which rebuke the affectations 



H. H. EMMONS, OF MICHIGAN. 485 

of superficial and irrationably fashionable society. They set a whole- 
some example of that practical medium style, that judicious regard for 
comfort in the midst of abundance, that familiarity with all around them, 
which so befits a prosperous American citizen. 

There are very few to whom the fither could point as an example 
for his son to follow with more safety than to him. When we have 
said this, the highest praise that can be bestowed upon any man has 
been given. 

It would be unjust to close this memoir and the secrets and causes 
of success but half told, did we withhold one of the chief elements in the 
happiness and consolations in the progress of Mr. Emmons. The un- 
obtrusive and eminently domestic tastes of his intelligent and beautiful 
lady would be wounded by more than a general reference to her per- 
fections as a mother and wife. When led to the altar Miss Williams 
was among the most beautiful women of her state, and a thorough, 
sound, practical education, high religious principles, and naturally liberal 
and kind emotions, made her all which the high merits of the man she 
chose so richly deserved. The happiness of the married life has been 
wholly without alloy. Even between those bound together by more 
than ordinary aflfection there will sometimes creep in little matters of 
difference to ruffle the temper and show they are mortals. And though 
no exemption from the imperfections of the clay is claimed, still it is by 
no means common for seven years of matrimonial life to pass without 
one angry word or a single subject of unpleasant difierence. Such is 
the fortunate history thus far of Mr. Emmons and his much resj^ected &s 
well as much loved wife. Nor is this peace around the hearthstone the 
result of tyranny on the one side and slavish servility on the other, 
Mrs. Emmons is the uncontrolled and supreme ruler of her house and 
household. Her checks are answered at the banker's and there is no 
supervision of accounts. !Mr. Emmons insists that nine ladies in ten 
would be more economical than their husbands if they were made their 
confidants, trusted with responsibilities, and knew they were looked to 
and treated as equals and advisers. 

Shoilld Mr. Emmons regain the health which his too indefatigable 
labors have now so seriously impaired it cannot be doubted that results 
will follow his continued activity which, when his whole course is run,' 
will entitle the writer who notices his life to omit all that preliminary 
justification and apology which was deemed appropriate for its notice 
now. 




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II 



REUBKN H. WALWOETH, OF NEW-YORK. 487 

HON. REUBEN H. WALWORTH, 

THE LAST OF THE NEW-YORK CHANCELLORS. 

Under a government like ours, where there are no privileged 
classes, and where no hereditary distinctions exist, it very frequently 
happens that the most important and responsible offices are held by 
those of whom it may very properly be said, they have been the pio- 
neers of their own fortunes — men who have received little or no assist- 
ance from wealthy or influential relatives, but who are indebted for 
their success in life to their own industry and perseverance. Indeed, 
this is generally the case in the United States ; and it is easy to see 
why it should be so. Native talent is not confined to any class of 
society ; tliough, as a general rule, it may reasonably be presumed 
that the children of intellectual parents will have more natural talent 
than the children of the ignorant, the stupid, or the imbecile. The 
sons of the wealthy, however, or of those who occupy situations of 
great power or influence, are too often found to rely upon the wealth 
or the influence of their parents, and seldom acquire those habits of 
industry, perseverance and energy which are essential to succcess. 
On the other hand, those whose parents are poor, or belong to the 
middle classes of society, being early taught the necessity of relying 
upon their own exertions, will be more apt to acquire that information 
and those business habits which alone can fit them for the discharge of 
important public trusts, and that industry and perseverance which 
usually ensure success. 

The subject of this biographical sketch was the third son of Benja- 
min Walworth ; and as many of the children and descendants of the 
latter have been members of the legal profession, or otherwise con- 
nected with the administration of justice, it may not be improper here 
to give a brief account of his family. 

Benjamin Walworth, who was the youngest of nine brothers and 
sisters, was the grandson of William Walworth, of Groton, Jn Con- 
necticut, who came to this country, from the neighborhood of London, 
near the close of the seventeenth century, with Governor Fitz John 
Winthrop. He lost his father in 1750, when he was only four years 
of age. He learned the trade of a hatter, and worked at it for several 
years after he arrived at manhood. In the early part of the Revolution 
he was adjutant of Colonel Stevens' New- York regiment, in the service 
of the United States, and was in the battle of White Plains. After the 
term of service of the regiment had expired, he was engaged in mer- 
chandise for a few years, but relinquished it soon after his marriage, 
and became a farmer, which business he followed until his death, in 
1812, leaving a small patrimony to each of his ten children. He was 
for many years an active politician in the county of Rensselaer, where 
he resided for the last thirty-nine years of his life; and was a supporter 
of the administrations of Jefferson and of Madison, and usually filled 
some of the local offices in the town where he resided. He was also 



488 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

a personal, as well as a political friend of the first Governor Clinton, 
afterwards Vice-President of the United States, and of his brother 
General Jannes Clinton, with whom he became acquainted in early 
life, while boarding with a near relative of theirs at Poughkeepsie. 

He married Apphia Hyde, a daughter of the Rev. Jedediah Hyde, 
a Separatist, or Baptist clergyman, of Norwich, who, at the lime of her 
marriage, was the widow of Samuel Cardell, of Bozrah. On her 
father's side she was descended from William Hyde and Matthew 
Marvin, two of the first settlers of Hartford ; and through her mater- 
nal grandfather, Joseph Tracy, the second son of Mary Winslow, who 
married the first John Tracy, of Norwich, she was the fourth in descent 
from Mary Chilton, who came to Plymouth in the Mayflower, in 
1620, and married John Winslow, a brother of the governor. 

Mrs. Walworth was a very talented and intellectual lady, and had 
received as good an education as it was usual for any females to re- 
ceive previous to the Revolution ; and she was very careful to infuse 
into the minds of her children the principles of morality, religion and 
virtue, and to inculcate those habits of prudence, industry and perse- 
verance, which were afterwards so conducive to their success in life 
after they left the paternal roof. 

William S. Cardell, her only child by her first husband, but who 
died many years since, became a distinguished scholar and teacher, and 
was the author of some valuable school-books and other literary and 
scientific works. Major John Walworth, her first son by the chancel- 
lor's father, was an officer in the army of the United States during the 
last war with England, and distinguished himself at the taking of Little 
York, where he led the advances under the command of General Pike, 
and was wounded by the side of that gallant officer at the time that 
the latter was killed. At the close of the war he left the army and 
settled at Plattsburgh, and was subsequently elected to the office of 
clerk of Clinton county, and continued to be elected from time to time 
imtil 1829, when he was appointed assistant-register of the Court of 
Chancery. He held this last office until his death, -in 1839, and 
discharged its duties to the perfect satisfaction of the court and the 
bar. 

James Clinton Walworth, the second son, is a successful farmer in 
the county of Otsego, and was for many years a judge of the Court of 
Common Pleas of that county. Benjamin, the fourth son, is a distin- 
guished physician and surgeon, residing at Fredonia, and was for seve- 
ral years one of the associate judges of the county of Chautauque. 
Jedediah H. Walworth, the fifth son, was a member of the bar of 
Washington county, but died in 1827, a year or two after he was 
licensed to practice. Hiram, the youngest son, was, during the life of 
his brother, the assistant-register, his deputy. He had the exclusive 
management of the financial concerns of the office, and the investment 
and control of several millions of money which were brought into 
court in the city of New- York ; which duty he discharged with great 
prudence and fidelity. Upon the death of his brother, he succeeded 
him in the office of assistant-register, which he held until he was in- 
duced to resign it on account of the loss of his sight. Oliver L. Bar- 
bour, the present reporter of the Supreme Court, is a son of the oldest 



REUBEN H. WALWORTH, OF NEW- YORK. 489 

daughter ; and Chancellor Walworth has three other nephews who are 
members of the bar in this state, and another who is a member of the 
profession in Wisconsin. 

Reuben Ilyde Walworth, the late chancellor, was born on the 26th 
of October, 1789, at Bozrah, a part of the nine miles square originally 
embraced within the bounds of the town of Norwich, in Connecticut ; 
and in February, 1793, he removed with his father's flimily to the 
town of Hoosick, in the State of New-York. He was brought up a 
farmer until the age of seventeen, with no advantages of education 
but such as could be obtained by attending the ordinary public schools 
of that day, during that part of the year when his services were not 
required on the farm. " Yet so anxious was he to get an education that, 
at the age of twelve, he went from home and worked through the 
winter, mornings and evenings, for his board, that he might have the 
advantage of a better common school than that in the vicinity of his 
father's residence. At the age of sixteen, he was himself a teacher of 
a village school durinji the winter months. He was also engaged in 
the same employment during the following winter." The only classical 
education which he ever received was for about fourteen weeks, while 
he was for the first time engaged in the business of school teaching 
hmiself. During that time, when he was not engaged in his school, he 
studied the Latin language and mathematics, under the advice and 
direction of Mr. Cardell, his half brother, who had received a liberal 
education. 

To a disability similar to that which the unrivaled success of the 
great Scotch novelist is attributed, the people of New- York were in- 
debted for the last of their chancellors. In the summer after he at- 
tained his seventeenth year, he met with an accident which incapa- 
citated him for a long time from working on a farm, and changed the 
whole course of his life. While engaged with an elder brother in 
drawing in a load of wheat from the harvest field, the loaded wagon 
was overturned, and both the wheat and the wagon were thrown down 
a precipice. Being on the top of the load, he, with his brother, was 
pitched down the precipice with it, and fell beneath the load of grain 
and the wagon, by which one of his ankles was so badly injured that his 
parents supposed he would be a cripple for life. 

As soon as he had sufficiently recovered from the effects of this acci- 
dent, which had unfitted him for farming, as to be able to engage in 
any other business, he went into a country store for a short time as a 
clerk. While there, he became acquainted with an attorney in the 
neighborhood of the store, and he then determined to endeavor to over- 
come the obstacles of a defective education, and to prepare himself for 
the bar. He entered his name with the attorney, and continued to 
study law under the direction of the latter for a few months, while he 
continued to discharge the duties of a merchant's clerk. But as the 
lawyer under whose direction he commenced his legal studies possessed 
very few books, and not a very extensive practice, he finally induced 
his father to furnish him the means of pursuing his studies at what was 
then the village of Troy — the place where the courts of the county 
were held, and where there were several lawyers of eminence in their 
profession. 



490 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

In the selection of an ofl'ice in which to pursue his legal studies, he 
was parlicularly fortunate in obtaining a first-rate legal instructor, 
whose office has become soniewhai celebrated for the numbtr of judicial 
officers who have received the whole or some part of their professional 
education there. The gentleman whose office he entered at Troy, and 
who had recently removed from the county of Washington, was Mr. 
John Russell, formerly state's attorney for the northern district of 
New-\ork, who died in the prime of life some fojty years since. This 
gentleman, whose name as counsel frequently appears in the first ten 
volumes of Johnson's IJeports, was one of the eminent lawyers of his 
day, and was said to be the best common law practitioner in the state. 
Hence, although Mr. Walworth was the only student in the office at 
the time when he first entered it, he had six or seven associates before 
he left there, three years afterwards. Among them were two others 
who have filled high judicial stations — William L. Marcy, afterwards 
one of the justices of the Supreme Court of the State of New-York ; 
and George Monell, who subsequently was the chief justice of the State 
of Michinan, were among the number. 

John Woodworth, who became the attorney-general of the State of 
New-York, and was subsequently a judge of the Supreme Court, built 
the office, and occupied it for several years ; and Chief Justice Savage, 
and Nathan Williams, for many years circuit judge for the fifth circuit, 
as well as Mr, Kussell, who subsequently owned and occupied the same 
office, were among the students who received their lecal education 
the rem. 

For the purpose of enabling him to pursue his studies to greater ad- 
vantage, ^Ir. Walworth, when he commenced his studies there, had a 
sleeping-bunk placed in the office, and lodged there most of the time 
during the three years he continued to be a student with Mr. Russell. 
At the end of the first year he had been so successful in acquiring a 
knowledge of the practice and of legal principles, that his legal instructor 
entrusted him with the whole charge of the office, and with the draft- 
ing of all the ordinary pleadings and proceedings ; and at the end of 
the second year he voluntarily offered him a year's board, on account 
of the services he performed beyond what was usually expected of 
students preparing themselves for the bar. At the age of twenty he 
was admitted to the bar of the Court of Common Pleas, and, in con- 
nection with Mr. John Palmer, who was licensed as an attorney of the 
Supreme Court about the same time, he commenced the practice of the 
law at Pittsburgh, in the county of Clinton. 

Mr. Russell, who, in his official capacity of public prosecutor or dis- 
trict attorney for the northern district of New-York, had frequently 
visited Plattsburgh, and was well acquainted there, gave to his late stu- 
dent letters of introduction to some of the most influential gentlemen 
of Clinton county, strongly recommending him to their patronage and 
support, as a talented, industrious, and well-informed young lawyer. 
This enabled him to get some legal business at once, without those har- 
assing delays which so often discourage young gentlemen of the bar 
at the commencement of their professional career. But according to 
the then practice of the courts, process was only made returnable at 
the regular terms ; and no trial, or even judgment by default, could bp- 



REUBEN H. WALWORTH^ OF NEW-TOKK. 491 

entered thereon until the second term after the return of the capias. 
The firm of Palmer and Walworth, therefore, had no suits of their own 
to attend to in court, until about nine months after they first located 
themselves at Plattsburgh. Mr. Walworth, however, was not idle in the 
meantime. 

Soon after he removed to Plattsburgh he was attacked by an epi- 
demic that then prevailed there, and was prostrated thereby for three 
or four weeks, which is the only severe sickness that he has ever expe- 
rienced of more than a day or two's continuance. That epidemic proved 
fatal to many adults ; and, among others, to one of the members of a 
legal firm in an extensive practice, who usually attended to the argu- 
ment and trial of the co-partnership causes. Shortly after Mr. Wal- 
worth had recovered from his sickness so far as to be able to attend to 
business, the surviving member of that firm applied to him for profes- 
sional assistance, informed him that his deceased partner had left, him 
with about twenty causes to be argued upon questions of law, or to be 
tried by jury, at the term which was to be held in the ensuing month. 
And although he was offered only the stinted fee of fifteen dollars for 
the service, Mr. Walworth readily accepted the offer, wisely concluding 
that what he failed to receive as an adequate pecuniary compensation, 
would be made up to him in professional reputation as a source of 
future profit. He accordingly prepared himself for the trial and argu- 
ment of all those causes, and at the next term of the court performed 
the service required of him to the perfect satisfaction of his employer, 
and also of the clients. The result was, as he had anticipated, that he 
secured to his own firm the future business of many of those clients. It 
also brought him to the notice of many business men of the county, 
who attended court at that term, as an energetic and talented young 
lawyer, to whom they or their friends might safely entrust the prose- 
cution or defence of their legal rights. 

The other member of the firm, Mr. Palmer, who was likewise a man 
of talent, and a good advocate, assisted in the trial and argument of 
some of the causes, by which he was also brought to the notice of the 
public. From that time business began to flow into their office rapidly; 
and during the eleven or twelve years that the co-partnership of Palmer 
and Walworth continued, no legal firm in the county did a more profita- 
ble professional business. 

Although Mr. Walworth made it a rule to accept no office or employ- 
ment which would interfere with his professional business and his duty 
to his clients, and frequently declined the oflTers of his friends to present 
his name as a candidate for the state legislature, he readily availed him- 
self of the offer of local oflices connected with the law, the duties of which 
could be discharged by him without interfering with his practice in the 
courts. 

Two years after he settled at Plattsburgh, he was appointed by Gover- 
nor Tompkins a justice of the peace for the county of Clinton, and a 
master of the Court of Chancery. Both of these offices he held, with the 
exception of a single year, until his appointment as circuit judge, in the 
spring of 1823. In 1817 he received the appointment of notary public. 
In the ensuing year the legislature passed a law creating the office of 
commissioner to perform certain duties of a judge of the Supreme Court, 



492 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

for the northern part of the state. And shortly afterwards Governor 
Clinton tendered that office to Mr. Walworth, which he accepted. 

The writer of a recent biographical sketch of the late chancellor says, 
that '■ in confidence of his ability, by his professional talents, to sustain 
the burthens and expenses of a family, Mr. Walworth, soon after he 
became a lawyer, formed that happy matrimonial connection, the disso- 
lution of which, by the death of his wife, in 1847, may be deemed the 
greatest misfortune of his life. Though he lost, in 1812, by the acci- 
dental destruction of his house by fire, all the avails of his previous la- 
bors, events soon proved that his reliance on his own powers were not 
misplaced. He had at once entered on a most successful practice, which 
would have conducted not only to professional eminence, but to pecu- 
niary affluence, had he not, at an age at which few young men can be con- 
sidered to have seriously engaged in the business of life, been called by 
his fellow-citizens to the councils of the nation, his labors in which had 
scarcely terminated before his talents were demanded in the then new 
organization of the judiciary of the state." 

The lady above alluded to, who became the wife of Mr. Walworth, 
in January, 1812, a few days after she had entered upon her seventeenth 
year, was Maria Ketchum Averill, the eldest daughter of Mr. Nathan 
Averill, of Plattsburgh. And as the success in life of every one, par- 
ticularly of a professional man, is intimately connected with the selec- 
tion which he makes of a wife, it may not be inappropriate here to 
introduce the following extract from a published sermon, upon the oc- 
casion of the death of the late Mrs. Walworth. In reference to her 
domestic and social character, her pastor says : 

"In all the relations of the family circle she was most faithful and 
successful ; as daughter, wife and mother, she will be mourned by those 
who survive, as few arc mourned. 

"In her native character, there was an uncommon loveliness, most 
attractive to all around her, making it easy for her to secure the friend- 
ship of her acquaintances; and an artlessness and ingenuousness which 
were certain to retain the affection which had been gained. Few persons, 
it is believed, had so many warm friends. These are all left with bleed- 
ing hearts to seek to comfort each other with the recollection of the 
virtues of the departed. 

"Perhaps if any single trait of her character were to be specified as 
surpassing all others in distinctness and excellence, her philanthropy, 
her almost unbounded benevolence, should be named. And yet this 
was the result of a combination of qualities of the highest order, and 
was merely the exhibition of these in action. Her liberality was of 
the kind which shrinks not from sacrifice. She was ready at all times to 
deny herself personal gratification, that she might thus add to the already 
large amount which every year she contributed for human happiness. 
She had a heart open to every demand of charity. She did not over- 
look the heathen because they are far away, — her attachment to the 
missionary cause, and to missionaries themselves, will be attested by 
many a herald of the cross in the distant parts of the world. At the 
same time she did not overlook the wants of those suffering around 
her, nor did she shrink from labor and toil in their behalf. She went 
to the houses of the poor and needy, dispensing her charity everywhere, 



REUBEN H. WALWORTH, OF NEW-YORK. 493 

and making it doubly precious by her sympathy and kindness. In 
this, she was, all her life, a model most worthy of imitation. There 
was no claim upon her kind feeling or benevolent action which was not 
at once promptly met. Everything especially which related to the 
poor and the degraded, awakened her warmest sympathy. In the 
Sabbath-school cause she was deeply interested, as the tears of the little 
children crowding around her lifeless body bore witness. For the poor 
inebriate she felt great solicitude, — some, reformed by her influence, 
live to call her their best earthly benefactress, and to lament her death. 
With her dying hands she made a generous contribution, I believe the 
last of a public nature, to relieve the wants of the suffering families of 
the intemperate. There was no impulse in her manner of giving and 
acting for her Master, — it was the natural, every-day movement of her 
soul. Her name became a proverb among us for beneficence, and as 
such, cannot be forgotten until all have followed her to the grave who 
knew her. She seemed to be acting continually as if she would merit 
the language of approbation which the Master bestowed upon one of 
her sisters in olden time: 'She hath done what she could" — and who 
among us has better deserved it]" 

By this lady. Chancellor Walworth had two sons and four daughters, 
all of whom, except the youngest daughter, who died at the age of five 
years, are still living. 

In the spring of 1851, Chancellor Walworth formed a second matri- 
monial connection with Mrs. Sarah Ellen Hardin, of Jacksonville, in 
the State of Illinois, the talented and accomplished widow of the late 
Col. John J. Hardin, of the first regiment of Illinois volunteers in the 
late war with Mexico, who fell at the battle of Buena Vista, and who 
was one of the most distinguished members of the bar in the western 
states. By this lady the late chancellor has one son. 

But to return to his early professional history and pursuits. Residing 
near the northern frontier of the United States during the late war with 
England, which commenced in 1812, and lasted three years, and Platts- 
burgh being a military post during most of the time, he became ac- 
quainted with many of the officers of our army, and was frequently 
employed by them as their professional adviser, and often extricated 
tliem from difficulties in which they became involved with citizens. 

In the spring of 1814, while the army, under the command ofMaj. Gen. 
Wilkinson, was stationed at Plattsburgh, a subaltern officer belonging to 
the British army came to that place in the character of a deserter, and in 
the disguise of a common soldier, and as such received a permit from the 
commanding officer to pass into the interior as far as Albany, but his 
real object was to ascertain the number and situation of our army on the 
northern frontier, and to learn the progress which had been made in the 
construction of the vessels of war which our government was then build- 
ing at Vergennes for the lake service. Having accomplished the ob- 
ject for which he came out, he was returning into Canada, in a citizen's 
dress, with the information he had obtained, when he was recognized 
and arrested within a few rods of the British lines, and was brought 
back as a prisoner to the American camp at Plattsburgh. A general 
court martial was immediately ordered for his trial. And such was the 
standing which Mr. Walworth had already acquired at the bar, although 



494 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

he was not yet entitled to an admission as a counselor of the Supreme 
Court, that he was selected and appointed by General Wilkinson as 
the judge advocate to conduct the proceedings upon that important 
trial, and on the trial of a colonel in the army, whose case was to be 
brought before the same military tribunal. Those services were per- 
formed with credit to himself, and to the entire satisfaction of the com- 
manding general ; and the unfortunate Lieut, Baker was condemned 
and executed as a spy of the enemy. 

Ihe village in which Mr. Walworth resided was twice visited by the 
enemy during that war ; and, as might be expected from what has 
been before stated, he could not remain a mere spectator when his 
country was not only engaged in what he deemed to be a just war, but 
was actually invaded by the enemy's troops. He sought for and ob- 
tained the appointment of aid to Major-General Mooers, with the rank 
of major in the militia of the state. He was in the service of his 
country in that capacity in 1813, when a brigade of the enemy, under 
the command of Colonel Murray, landed at Plattsburgh, and destroyed 
the arsenal, and the barracks at Pike's cantonment. But General 
Mooers, and the small body of militia which was called out at that 
time, were obliged to retire before a much superior force. 

When the British again invaded the northern part of New- York with 
an army of 14,000 regular troops, in September, 1814, and came as far 
south as Plattsburgh, Brigadier-General Macomb, who had been left by 
General Izard in command of the forts at that place with a garrison of 
1,500 regulars, made a requisition upon Major-General Mooers, under 
authority from the President, to order into the service of the United 
States his whole division, with the exception of the brigade in Columbia 
county. The division was called out accordingly ; and Gen. Mooers, 
being the superior officer, took the command of the militia called out, 
and of such volunteers as arrived at Plattsburgh previous to the retreat 
of the enemy, though he left General Macomb in command of the forts. 
Major Walworth, who was still one of the aids of the majorgeneral, 
was assigned by the latter to discharge the duties of adjutant-general 
of the forces under the command of the latter. 

When we recollect the despondency which the capture of Washing- 
ton, and the destruction of the capitol by the British, during the preced- 
ing month, had universally created, and when we connect the victory 
of Commodore McDonough on Lake Champlain with the achievements 
of the militia and volunteers under Major-General Mooers, and of the 
regulars under Brigadier-General Macomb, the occurrences at Platts- 
burgh must be reckoned among the most glorious events to which the 
war of 1812 gave rise. The whole American forces consisted of 700 
militia and 1,500 regulars, while the British troops amounted to 14,000 ; 
a disparity even far surpassing that at New-Orleans, 

On the evening of the 5th of September, the right wing of the British 
army was advanced on the Beekmantown road to within seven or eight 
miles of the village of Plattsburgh. Sometime in the evening Major- 
General Mooers, whose head-quarters were on the same road, some two 
or three miles nearer the village, expressed his regret that he had no 
regular troops to support the militia and volunteers in the anticipated 
conflict with the advancing enemy the next day. The acting adjutant 



REUBEN n. WALWORTH, OF NBW-TORK. 495 

general immediately volunteered his services to proceed at once to 
Brigadier-General Macomb's quarters at the village, and near the forts, 
with an order for him to detach two or three companies of infantry and 
one of light artillery from the garrison under his command, and that 
they should report themselves to General Mooers at Beekmantown 
the next morning. An order to that effect was accordingly made out, 
and Major Walworth proceeded at once to General Macomb's quarters 
and delivered such order. The night being very dark, he did not deem 
it prudent to attempt to return to Beekmantown that night. He slept 
upon the floor of his own deserted mansion in the village until daylight, 
and then rode back to head-quarters. 

He had just finished a light breakfast, when information was brought 
that the enemy was upon the advance. He was thereupon ordered by 
the general to select two companies of the Clinton county regiment of 
militia, and proceed about a mile to the creek which crossed the I'oad, 
and take up the bridge, so as to retard the advance of the enemy's 
artillery. The order was promptly obeyed, so far as to proceed to the 
place indicated by the order. But just as the detachment under the 
command of Major Walworth commenced the destruction of the bridge, 
the enemy approached in force and commenced firing upon them, 
wounding two of the detachment severely, and one of them mortally. 
The fire was returned ; and the detachment was then ordered to fall 
back to where Major Wool, with about 150 regulars, who had been de- 
tached from the garrison under the order of the evening previous, had 
already arrived and was stationed. 

The regulars were then formed in the highway, and with the detach- 
ment of militia on their flanks, waited the approach of the enemy, when 
a heavy fire was opened upon the head of the British column and 
momentarily arrested its progress. But the brigade of the enemy 
which was advancing being 3,500 strong, the regulars under the gal- 
lant Wool, as well as Major Walworth's detachment of militia, were 
soon compelled to give way and fall back to where the commanding 
general, with the main body of the militia and volunteers, was station- 
ed. At that point the fighting became general, and continued so at 
intervals until the enemy's forces reached the village, and our troops 
had placed themselves behind the Saranac, which runs through the vil- 
lage north of the forts. 

In a published account of this battle of the 6th of September, 1814, 
commonly called the Battle of Beekmantown, Major Walworth is 
specially named as one of the officers who, in connection with Major 
Wool, succeeded in rallying the militia and regulars that awaited the 
approach of the enemy at Culvus Hill, about four miles from Platts- 
burgh ; which position was maintained with so much firmness as to 
compel the enemy to fall back for a time. It was then that the gallant 
Willington, Lieut.-Coloncl of the 3d. Buffs was killed, while leading his 
regiment to the charge against our forces, and where several British 
officers were wounded. 

Major Walworth was also in the battle of the 11th of September, 
when a British brigade, under Major-General the Baron De Rotten- 
burgh, crossed the Saranac at Pike's cantonment ; and where, in the 
language of General Macomb, " they were repulsed by the brave vol- 



490 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

unteers and militia, and suffered severely in killed, wounded, and 
prisoners." Shortly before that action, he had been sent by General 
Mooers to order the Vermont volunteers, then upon the lake shore, to 
take a position on the Saranac, at the place where the battle after- 
wards commenced. While in the performance of that duty he had the 
pleasure of witnessing the termination of the naval engagement on the 
lake ; and he brought to his commanding officer, just as the enemy 
approached the river to cross, the first intelligence of the result of that 
engagement, which not only secured to us the command of Lake 
Champlain, but, with the evidences of bravery and prowess already ex- 
hibited on the part of the militia as well as the regular army, left to 
the enemy no hope of a successful invasion of our country. After the 
termination of the war, Major Walworth received a commission from 
Governor Clinton, appointing him division judge advocate, with the 
rank of colonel. 

As we have already seen, Mr. Walworth sprang from a democratic 
stock ; and he has from his boyhood continued to be a consistent mem- 
ber of the democratic party, though many of his most devoted per- 
sonal friends belonged to the party to which he was politically op- 
posed. He has seldom been a candidate for any political office, and 
never when there was any probability of success at the time of his 
nomination. 

But in 1821, in connection with General Pitcher, who was after- 
■ wards lieutenant-governor, he was elected to the Congress of the 
United States, from the double district comprising the counties ot 
Washington, Warren, Clinton, Essex, and Franklin. And some idea 
of his personal popularity at that time may be formed from the fact, 
that he everywhere was a-head of his ticket, and was elected by about 
1,200 majority over the highest of the opposition candidates, in a dis 
trict where the majority given the year previous for the political party, 
to which such opposition candidates belonged, was much larger the 
other way. 

During the two years, from 1821 to 1823, that Mr. Walworth was 
in the House of Representatives, it may be safely affirmed that no 
member of Congress was more indefatigable in the performance of his 
public duties. It would be difficult to find any occasion, where the yeas 
and nays are recorded, in which his name is omitted. Scarcely a day 
passed, in which the journals do not attest his presence by a reference 
of the petitions presented by him, many of which came from his im- 
mediate constituents, and to which, as arising from the invasion of our 
state during the then recent war, he himself, an actor in the memorable 
events at Plattsburgh, could not be insensible ; by the resolutions which 
he offered on matters interesting to his district, the state, or the Union; 
and by the reports which he made on behalf of the military committee 
— to which he was appointed early in the session, on the resignation of 
General Solomon Van Rensselaer, and of which he was thenceforward 
the most prominent member. 

It was in the discharge of these duties that he had occasion to bring 
to the notice of Congress the heroic achievements of a gallant band of his 
fellow-soldiers, at the siege of Plattsburgh, composed — like the garde 
mobile, during the late struggle in Paris — of youths below the ordinary 



REUBEN H. WALWORTH, OF NEW-TOKK. 497 

age for military duty, of volunteers between 15 and 17. He asked for 
each of them, what Gen. Macomb had promised on the field of battle, 
a rifle, as a memento for his services. The act obtained the assent of 
the House, b\it it was not until a subsequent session that it became a 
law, through the exertions of the Hon. Aaron A. Ward, of Westches- 
ter, who, as an officer of the regular army, had participated in the de- 
fence of Plattsburgh. 

In December, 1821, before he became a member of the military com- 
mittee, a resolution of the House had instructed that committee to in- 
quire and report whether the army had been reduced according to the 
provisions of the act of March, 1821, to reduce and fix the military 
peace establishment. After Colonel Walworth was substituted in the 
place of the member of the committee who had resigned his seat in 
Congress, he was requested by the chairman. Dr. Eustis, who had him- 
self been at the head of the war department a few years previous, to 
examine the legal objections which were made to the manner in which 
Mr. Calhoun, the then Secretary of War, had carried into effect the law 
for the reduction and reorganization of the army. He subsequently 
prepared a very able report on the subject, fully sustaining the legality 
of the course which had been pursued in reducing the army ; although 
one of the decisions of Mr. Calhoun involved the dismissal from the 
service of a distinguished officer, who had been, and still was, one of 
Colonel Walworth's personal friends. This report received the appro- 
bation of Dr. Eustis, and most of the other members of the military 
committee ; and the member who had prepared it was instructed to 
present it to the House. 

This report, however, gave offence to a distinguished individual whose 
feelings had become strongly enlisted upon the other side of the ques- 
tion, and in hostility to Mr. Calhoun; and at whose request, as was 
supposed by the friends of the Secretary of War, the resolution of in- 
quiry had been brought before the House. To this course alone the late 
chancellor attributes the unfriendly feelings of that gentleman ; and 
which induced him a few years since to exert his influence as a senator 
of the United States, to prevent a confirmation of the nomination of 
Mr. Walworth as one of the associate justices of the Supreme Court. 

It was within the scope of Mr. Walworth's congressional duties, not 
only to defend the conduct of General Jackson, as governor of Florida, 
in the imprisonment of Colonel Callava, who, at the instigation and in 
connivance with others, attempted to defraud the orphan daughter of a 
deceased Spanish officer, by carrying off the papers containing the evi- 
dence of her rights in a suit pending in the military tribunals of the 
territory, but he also had an opportunity to sustain, against the assaults 
of political opponents, the Indian Agency of General Cass, in Michigan, 
and thus early to vindicate the public services and unimpeachable fame 
of that distinguished individual. 

In connection with his friend and colleague, the late William B. 
Rochester, who was subsequently the democratic candidate for governor, 
he succeeded in defeating the attempt of one of the federal representa- 
tives of the state to deprive of their pay the officers of the court martial, 
which had tried and condemned the recreant militiamen, who had refused 
to turn out at the call of their country, when the state was invaded by 

32 



498 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

the British army. But one of his happiest efforts on the floor of Con- 
gress, was his speech, in January, 1823, in favor of the bereaved sister 
of Lieutenant Allen, who was killed by the pirates, and whose mother 
had died before the contemplated provision in her behalf could be pass- 
ed. " I hope and trust," said he, "that the sister whose desolate situ- 
ation gave an additional pang to the heart of the dying hero — she, who 
has thus been deprived not only of the support of a kind and worthy 
brother, but also of the guardian care of a pious and affectionate parent, 
may receive that bounty which Congress intended to bestow upon the 
mother." 

Though he voted against the bankrupt law, which was proposed 
while he was in Congress, he offered to meet the recent decision of the 
Supreme Court of the United States on the insolvent laws, by provi- 
ding, by an amendment to the Constitution, that, " till Congress shall 
establish uniform laws on the subject of bankruptcies throughout the 
United States, it shall be lawful for the several states, or any of them, 
to enact bankrupt laws, in the same manner, and with the like effect, 
as they might have done previous to the adoption of the Constitution of 
the United States. 

Mr. Walworth gave his vote in favor of an appropriation to enable 
the President to recognize the independence of the Spanish American 
states. He also called the attention of the House of Representatives 
to the British act of 5th August, 1822, which imposed upon our trade 
with Canada the most onerous restrictions, and by his course led the 
way to the assertion of our right to the navigation of the St. Lawrence 
— a right of inestimable value to the citizens of northern New- York. 

By the constitution of 1821, which went into operation on the 1st of 
January, 1823, the organization of the judiciary was materially affect- 
ed ; and by its provisions, a circuit judge was required to be appointed 
in each of the eight senatorial districts. The duties of these judges 
were not only to preside in the Courts of Oyer and Terminer, and to 
trj' civil causes at Nisi Prius, but they were made, subordinate to the 
chancellor, equity judges in their respective circuits. Mr. Walworth 
was appointed judge of the fourth circuit, and immediately removed to 
Saratoga Springs, his present residence. 

It is foreign to our intention to enter upon an analysis of Judge 
Walworth's judicial services. During the five years that he acted as a 
circuit judge, opportunities occurred to extend the reputation which he 
had previously acquired at the bar and in Congress. The charges 
and sentences of the court were extensively circulated in the cases of 
the Thayers and of Vedeto, and to which, from the heinousness of the 
culprits' guilt, general attention was attracted. The sentence of the 
court in the former case is published in a popular treatise on elocution, 
as a specimen of judicial eloquence. Though the decisions of the cir- 
cuit judges were not embraced within the purview of the State Reports, 
yet such was the ability with which Walworth already grappled with 
the niceties of chancery law — such the extent of his attainments in all 
the cognate branches of jurisprudence, that with regard to him an ex- 
ception was made, and the reporter, the late Judge Cowen, introduced 
some of them with the declaration, that no excuse need be made for 
laying before the profession " such able and luminous discussions." 



REUBEN H. WALWORTH, OF NEW-YORK. 499 

In 1828. on Chancellor Jones' retiring from the office of chancellor, 
Judge Walworth naturally supposed that the office would be filled by 
one of the justices of the Supreme Court, and that his friend, and for- 
mer colleague in Congress, General Pitcher, then the acting governor, 
would offer him the vacant seat upon the bench of the last mentioned 
court; which office he would have accepted without hesitation. But on 
calling at the governor's room, as he was casually passing through Al- 
bany, he was surprised with an offer of the appointment of chancellor. 
He at once told his friend, the governor, that he ought to give the office 
to Chief Justice Savage, who was every way competent to discharge the 
duties thereof; and that if he preferred to retain the situation of chief 
justice, Mr. Justice Sutherland should be appointed. And it was not 
until both of those gentlemen had been consulted, and had absolutely 
refused to undertake to discharge the arduous and responsible duties of 
the office of chancellor, that Mr. Walworth, after some hesitation, con- 
sented to accept the highest judicial office in the state. As Mr. Justice 
Woodworth would in a few months be constitutionally disqualified to 
hold the office, it was not deemed necessary to consult him on the 
subject. 

Chancellor Walworth received his appointment on the 22d of April, 
1828, just five years from the time he accepted the office of circuit judge, 
and on the 28th he held his first court as chancellor, and delivered writ- 
ten opinions in several cases which appear in the reports. 

In his address to the bar on assuming his seat, he thus modestly 
referred to his past and present position : " Brought up," says he, "a 
farmer till the age of seventeen, deprived of all the advantages of a 
classical education, and with a very limited knowledge of chancery law, 
I find myself, at the age of thirty-eight, suddenly and unexpectedly 
placed at the head of the judiciary of the state — a situation which has 
heretofore been filled by the most able and experienced members of the 
profession." 

As chancellor, not only was he called upon to decide upon the many 
complicated questions growing out of trusts, frauds, and the various 
other branches of equity jurisprudence, and also all matters involving 
the rights of infants and lunatics, as well as appeals from the surrogates 
of the fifty-nine counties of the state, and who administer what in Eng- 
land is a distinct branch of jurisprudence ; but, as a member of the Court 
of Errors, he was required to review all the intricate legal decisions 
which had been passed on by the Supreme Court, and as to which either 
of the litigating parties might be dissatisfied. 

Chancellor Walworth's adjudications in his own court are collected 
in the fourteen volumes of Paige and Barbour, while the opinions which 
he pronounced in the Court of Errors are to be found in the thirty- 
eight volumes of Wendell, Hill and Denio. The reported cases, how- 
ever, constitute but a small portion of the decisions made by him during 
the twenty years he held the office of chancellor. In addition to the 
oral decisions made in open court upon the close of the argument, or 
in cases where a mere memorandum of the decision was indorsed upon 
the papers, his written opinions fill thirty-nine large folio volumes in 
manuscript. By a report made to the senate, in 1836, it appears that 
the number of decrees, and decretal orders, and other special orders 



600 BKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

and decisions made by the chancellor in one year only, including de- 
cisions in cases brought before him on appeals from vice-chancellors 
and surrogates, was eleven hundred and forty ; of these one hundred 
and thirty-eight were decrees made in calendar causes. But his calen- 
dar causes did not embrace his numerous decisions in cases upon ap- 
peals from interlocutory orders of vice-chancellors ; which appeals were 
heard at the motion terms of the court, and were not placed on any 
calendar. 

No one can examine the volumes which contain Chancellor "Wal- 
worth's reported adjudications, without being satisfied, not only that 
he is a profound lawyer, but that his attainments in all collateral 
branches of learning are most extensive ; and that in no respect does he 
yield to any judge by whom the judicial annals of our state have been 
illustrated. To learn the general sentiments of the profession, it is only 
necessary to recur to what may be every where found conceded in the 
contemporary reports of other states. We have the authority of the 
late Justice Story, given at a time when he expected to have him as an 
associate on the bench of the Supreme Court of the United Stales, for 
asserting that "Walworth is the greatest equity jurist now living;" and 
his own illustrious predecessor. Chancellor Kent, did not hesitate to 
bear the most ample testimony to the merits of his decisions, declaring 
that he had referred to them in his Commentaries, wherever he could 
make them apply, and adding in reference to them, " 1 am proud of my 
own native state." 

Although Chancellor Walworth owed nothing to colleges in early 
life, the most celebrated universities of the country have vied with one 
another in according to him their highest distinctions. In 1835 the 
degree of LL.D., was conferred on him by the college of New-Jersey, 
at Princeton ; and the same honors have been since bestowed on him by 
Yale College at New-Haven, and by Harvard University at Cambridge. 

In all associations for ameliorating the moral condition of mankind, 
Chancellor Walworth has been a prominent and efficient actor; but by 
no trait is he more distinguished than by the extent of his beneftictions, 
and which, considering his limited means, may be deemed truly muni- 
ficent. Though to the religious denomination with which he is con- 
nected, his contributions have been most ample, amounting in one case 
to $2,000, his charities have been limited by no sectarian standard. 
After the ravages of the yellow fever in New-York, in 1819, Mr. Wal- 
worth, then a young lawyer at Plattsburgh, sent unsolicited a draft for 
$100 for the suffering poor, accompanied by a letter to the mayor, the 
Hon. Cadwallader D. Colden, which was published at the time to induce 
others to do likewise, and from which we learn the fact of the donation. 

Chancellor Walworth was among the foremost to stimulate his coun- 
trymen to afford efficient relief to the people of Ireland, when suffering 
from the famine of 1847. He acted as one of the vice-presidents, and 
addressed the meeting at Albany on the 12th of February, 1847, at 
which the governor of the state presided. Before leaving that city he 
sent to the committee a donation of $200, accompanied by a letter in- 
dicating the most advantageous mode of its application, and on his re- 
turn home, he presided at another meeting, convened at Saratoga 
Springs, for the same object. He shortly afterwards made another 



REUBEN n. WALWOBTH, OF NEW-TORK. 501 

remittance, for the suffering people of Scotland, to the president of the 
St. Andrew's Society of New-York, and which was publicly acknowl- 
edged at the time. 

He was one of the earliest friends of the temperance cause ; and at 
the organization of the State Society in 1829, he was its first presiding 
officer ; to which situation he was annually elected until his appoint- 
ment as president of the American Temperance Union, in 1843, upon 
the resignation of General Cocke, of Virginia. For many years he has 
been one of the corporate members of the American Board of Commis- 
sioners for Foreign Missions ; and is one of the most active and influ- 
ential lay members of that board. Since he left the bench, he has been 
elected to the situation of one of the vice-presidents of the national 
Tract Society. He is also a vice-president of the American Bible 
Society ; and a corresponding member of the British and Foreign Tem- 
perance Society. More than thirty years since, he made a profession 
of religion, and united with the Presbyterian Church, and is now one of 
its elders. 

Though Chancellor Walworth did not deem it consistent with the 
character of his judicial station to enter into the arena of active politics, 
he was not, during the twenty-five years that he occupied a seat on the 
bench, insensible to the interests either of his party or of his country. 
When, in 1832, a collision arose between the Supreme Court of the 
United States and the State of Georgia, growing out of the Indian 
titles in that state, and which led to the imprisonment of certain mis- 
sionaries, Chancellor Walworth, who, as a member of Congress, had 
fully investigated the subject, and come to the conclusion in favor of 
the claim of Georgia to the prompt extinguishment by the national 
government of the Indian titles within her limits, successfully inter- 
posed, as a private individual, with Governor Lumpkin, and obtained 
the liberation of the missionaries ; thus terminating what might other- 
wise have resulted in a most unhappy controversy between the powers 
of a sovereign state and the highest judicial authority of the Union. 
In the performance of this patriotic duty, he acted in concert with the 
Rev. Dr. Nott, of Union College, and Benjamin F. Butler, Esq., 
who was afterwards the attorney-general of the United States ; to 
whom their co ntry is deeply indebted for their exertions on that 
occasion. 

When the Canadian outbreak took place, in 1837, some of the most 
influential men of both provinces were driven from their homes by the 
tyranny of those who then held rule there. The chancellor, although 
he advised against a hopeless contest which, he was aware, would only 
end in the ruin of the oppressed colonists, deeply sympathized with the 
unfortunate exiles, furnished funds for their relief, and took into his own 
family the son of the amiable and excellent Papineau,the former speaker 
of the parliament of Lower Canada, while he gave erery aid and encour- 
agement in his power to the learned and estimable Bidwell, the former 
speaker of the parliament of the Upper Province, who is now a respect- 
ed member of the New- York bar. 

On the death, in 1844, of Judge Thompson, of the Supreme Court of 
the United States, public opinion pointed to Chancellor W^alworth as 
his successor. His name was presented to the President (John Tyler) 



bVZ SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

by a majority of the New- York delegation in Congress, and he was also 
recommended for the office by many of the leading members of the bar 
of the state of both political parties. Among others, Chief Justice 
Nelson, who afterwards received the appointment, wrote a strong letter 
to the President on the subject ; and after the rejection of Mr. Spencer 
by the Senate, the President sent in the name of Chancellor Walworth. 
The nomination was referred to the judiciary committee, who delayed 
making a report, and finally the appointment was laid upon the table or 
postponed until after the next presidential election, apparently by a 
mere party vote. Near the close of the next session of Congress, how- 
ever, it was ascertained that there had been a secret agreement between 
a whig member of the judiciary committee and one of the democratic 
senators from the west, that the nomination of Mr. Walworth should 
not be acted on during Mr. Tyler's presidential term. And, although 
every member of the New-York legislature and many of the leading 
members of the bar of both political parties, sent memorials to the 
Senate, urging a confirmation, the nomination was never brought before 
that body by the judiciary committee, either for confirmation or rejection. 
A few days before the expiration of his term of office, the President, 
being satisfied that the nomination would not be acted on during his 
continuance in office, reluctantly M'ithdrew it, and sent in the name of 
the friend of Chancellor Walworth, Chief Justice Nelson. 

The Court of Chancery was abolished by the constitution of 1846 ; 
but the convention, which formed that constitution — for the purpose of 
enabling the chancellor to hear and decide the equity cases then pend- 
ing before him, and which were ready for argument — provided for the 
continuance of his office and his salary until the 1st of July, 1848. In 
April, 1847, the legislature, desirous of securing to the state the benefit 
of the legal learning of Chancellor Walworth for a longer period, 
placed him at the head of the commission organized under the provi- 
sions of the new constitution, to reduce into a written and systematic 
code the whole body of the statute and common law of the state ; and 
they subsequently extended the time for his taking the oath of office 
several months, for the purpose of inducing him to accept the appoint- 
ment after the new judiciary system of the state should have gone into 
operation. After considering the subject two days, the chancellor, in 
a letter to the legislature, which is full of instruction, respectfully de- 
clined the appointment. He put his declension of this important duty 
upon the ground, that the commission was not so organized as to give 
the commissioners sufficient time and means to frame such a code as 
would carry out the principle of the constitution on the subject, and be 
creditable to the commissioners and to the state, and not because he 
supposed such a codification of the laws to be impracticable. 

In his letter to the legislature, he says : " I am not one of those who 
believe it is wholly impracticable to carry out the provisions of the 
constitution on this subject. On the contrary, I think it not only prac- 
ticable but highly expedient to collect the general principles of the 
unwritten commercial and other civil laws, and of our equity system, 
as well as the criminal law of the state, now scattered through some 
thousands of volumes of treatises, commentaries, digests, and reports of 
judicial decisions, and to arrange them under appropriate heads, divi- 



REUBEN H. WALWORTH, OF NEW-TORE. 503 

sions and titles, in connection with the statute law on the same subjects. 
Such modifications of the law should also be suggested and incorporated 
into the code as are necessary to adapt the laws of the state to the 
present advanced condition of society, and to the principles of our free 
institutions." 

The same reasons which induced Chancellor Walworth to decline the 
appointment of commissioner of the code at that time, prevented him 
from accepting the same office when it was tendered to him by Governor 
Fish two years afterwards. And that he was right in supposing the 
commission was not properly organized for a creditable codification of 
the laws of the state, is evident from the fact that it proved an entire 
failure, and was ultimately abandoned. 

Chancellor Walworth held his last regular term for the hearing of 
causes in May, 1848. At a meeting of the members of the bar of the 
state, attending the general term of the Supreme Court, a few days 
afterwards, at which meeting the attorney-general presided, the follow- 
ing resolution was unanimously adopted, which shows the estimate 
placed upon the judicial services of the late chancellor by those v/ho had 
been in the habit of attending his court: 

" Resolved — That we deem the close of our former judiciary system 
a fitting occasion for the expression of our respect and regard for the 
eminent jurist, who, for so many years past, has discharged the labori- 
ous and responsible duties of chancellor of this state, and whose last 
term for hearing arguments has recently ended ; that the published 
volumes of his decisions evince a degree of acuteness and discrimina- 
tion, love of truth, sound morality, and thorough legal research, unsur- 
passed by any others, and honorable alike to himself and to the juris- 
prudence of our state." 

At the close of his judicial labors on the 1st of July thereafter, of the 
numerous causes and motions which had been argued before him, or 
submitted by counsel for his decision, he left but eight undecided. 

Since he left the bench he has not returned to the practice of his pro- 
fession at the bar, but confined himself to the business of chamber 
counsel, and to the investigation of legal questions submitted to him, or 
for his examination or decision, by the parties interested in such ques- 
tions. In that branch of professional labor his legal talents and attain- 
ments have been put in requisition by clients from nearly every part 
of the United States. 

In reference to the correctness of his adjudications while at the head 
of the most important equity court in the Union, and the character of 
Chancellor Walworth as a judge, we may say with the late Dane 
Professor of Law in Harvard University, that '-never, perhaps, were so 
many decisions made where so few were inaccurate as to facts, or erro- 
neous in law. If it was destined that the Court of Chancery should fall 
under a reform which apparently designs to obliterate the history as 
well as the legal systems of the past, it is a consolation to reflect that it 
fell without imputation on its purity or usefulness, and that no court 
was ever under the guidance of a judge purer in character or more 
gifted in talent than the last Chancellor of New-York." 



1 




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LUTHER BADGEK, OF NEW-YORK. 505 

HON. LUTHER BADGER, 

OF BROOME COUNTY, NEW-YORK. 

Praise is always due to merit, and especially where merit is the 
product of unassisted toil and perseverance. The "self-made man" 
commands our highest respect. Those struggles, by means of which 
he has risen from obscurity to honorable distinction, cannot fail to en- 
list our sympathy and call forth our warmest applause. 

Luther Badger was born April 10th, 1785, in Patridgefield, (now the 
town of Peru,) Berkshire county, Massachusetts. 

His father, Lemuel Badger, was a volunteer in the Revolutionary 
contest which separated us from the mother country, and bore a com- 
mission under Gen. Montgomery in the invasion of Canada. In the 
fall of 1786, while Luther was yet an infant, the family emigrated to 
what was at that time considered the "far west," and settled on the 
Susquehanna River, in Broome county. New- York. 

That whole tract of country, now so densely populated, and justly 
regarded as one of the finest agricultural sections of the state, was then 
an unbroken wilderness, where the whoop of the Indian, the scream of 
the panther, and the howl of the wolf, were sounds much more familiar 
than the voice of civilized man! 

There, amid the wild scenes of nature in her primeval dress, subject 
to the inconveniences, privations and hardships inseparably connected 
with life in the new settlements, Luther Badger grew up to manhood. 

Few boys thus reared would have had the courage to face the diffi- 
culties that must of necessity stand in the way of literary pursuits. 
Very few thus situated, with no means for acquiring an education but 
such as they were able to procure by their own industry, would ever 
have attempted to scale the lofty barriers that surround the learned 
professions, to gain a place at the bar. 

But with an insatiable thirst for knowledge, noble ambition, and a 
firm determination to rise in the world, Luther Badger looked out from 
the deep forests, in the shades of which he had been nurtured, and re- 
solved that nothing short of absolute impossibilities should prevent him 
from occupying a commanding position in society.* 

By making the best use of his scanty opportunities, he succeeded in 



* Mr. Badger, in speaking of this period of his life says, that he used often, when 
a boy, to ascend a bold promontory or cliff that was situated in the rear of liis 
father's residence, and seating himself where he had an extensive view of the Sus- 
quehanna valley and the surrounding hills, covered with dense forests, unbroken, as 
yet, except at a few points, by the axe of the settlers, he used to muse and specu- 
late for hours together as to what would be the ultimate fate of this region, and 
what was now the condition of other sections of country. Would these forests 
ever be cleared away 1 Would these hills ever be cultivated 1 What must be the 
principal differences between this and other and older settlements 1 And, said he, 
" I determined that I would know something about the world, and if there was 
a better country I would try to find it." This was while he had never seen any 
other section than that in which he lived. 



606 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

gaining such an acquaintance with the common branches of an English 
education as at the age of nineteen to enter the Hamilton and Oneida 
Academy, (now Hamilton College,) where he pursued his studies two 
years, though some portion of this time he was out of the institution 
engaged in teaching a common school. 

In 1807 he commenced the study of law under the tuition of William 
Eager, Esq., in Manlius, Onondaga county, New- York, and three years 
afterward entered the law office of Randall and Wattles, in New-Hart- 
ford, Oneida county. 

At the May term of the Supreme Court, in 1812, he was admitted 
to the bar. 

The examination on this occasion, which was conducted by Judge 
Van Ness, was uncommonly strict and critical ; but Mr. Badger acquitted 
himself so well throughout, as to gain the admiration of the class and 
the respect of all present. 

He now returned to Manlius, the place where he commenced his 
studies, and opened an office. There he practised twelve years with 
large and constantly Increasing success. But though gifted with a natu- 
rally strong constitution, his close and intense application to the duties 
of his profession so impaired his health, that he was compelled to retire 
from practice, which he did not resume until 1832. 

In" 1824, soon after he had retired from business, he was elected by 
the people of Onondaga, and represented them in the 19th Congress, 
though he was not connected with the strongest political party in that 
district. 

Mr. Badger is above the middle size, and uniting with dignified man- 
ners a correct taste, he was fitted to adorn any circle in which he was 
called to move. Add to this his undoubted Integrity of character and 
fidelity to all his business engagements, and it will not appear at all 
strange that many trusts, both civil and military, should have been 
committed to his keeping. 

He was, in 1809, attached to the staff of Colonel Thaddeus M. Wood 
as serjeant-major, and three years afterward was appointed quarter- 
master by Governor Tompkins. He was several times called out with 
his regiment to Oswego, Smith's Mills, and other points along the lines, 
in the last war with Great Britain, but was not in any engagement. 

In 1819, Mr. Wood having been raised to the rank of brigadier- 
general, nfade Mr. Badger his aid-de-camp, and the next year Governor 
Clinton appointed him judge-advocate for the twenty-seventh brigade of 
infantry of the State of New- York. This last office he held eight years, 
and then resigned it, and retired from military service. 

During several years Mr. Badger was engaged in the mercantile busi- 
ness, but in that calling he was by no means successful. 

In 1832 he returned to the county of Broome, and resumed the prac- 
tice of law, which he has since continued. 

Of his success as a lawyer, neither himself nor his friends have reason 
to complain or be ashamed. In the course of his business he has had 
the management of many important suits in the Supreme Court, in the 
Court of Chancery, and in the United States Courts, which he has almost 
invariably managed to the satisfaction of his clients, seldom failing to 
secure their rights. 



LUTHER BADGER, OF NEW-YORK. 60'7 

On one occasion, while practising in Onondaga, he was called to de- 
fend a strongly-contested suit in Oswego. The opposing counsel were 
several of the most distinguished members of" the legal profession in 
the state, among whom was General Wood, 

Mr. Badger, in his defence, displayed so much ability, and such ma- 
ture acquaintance with the system of American jurisprudence, that he 
was strongly solicited by several of the most prominent citizens of Os- 
wego to settle in their village, and to accept of the office of first judge 
of that county ; but his engagements at the time were such as prevented 
him from complying with their request. 

The circumstances of his admission to the Court of Chancery as a 
solicitor, which took place in 1819, are somewhat amusing. Being in 
Albany, he concluded to call and ask admission to practise in that 
court. He did so, and was ushered by a servant into the chancellor's 
room. Mr. Kent was seated behind a table, at the further end of the 
room, writing, with his face turned towards the door through which Mr. 
Badger entered. But he did not stop writing, or look up, until Mr. 
Badger reached the middle of the room, when he arose from his chair, 
and the following dialogue occurred : 

Chancellor Kent. — " How do you do, sir ? how do you do, sir ? 
What is your name ?" 

Mr. £.—'' Luther Badger." 

Chan. — " Where do you live?" 

Mr. ^.— " In Onondaga." 

Chan. — " You belong to the learned profession, do vou not ?" 

J/r. ^.— "Ido." 

Chan. — " Well, you have come to be admitted to my court ?" 

Mr. B. — " That is the object for which I have called." 

Chan. — " Well, what do you know ^bout chancery ?" 

Mr. B. — "I confess that I know but little about it." 

Chan. — Well, how then do you expect to be admitted ? What have 
you to show 1 

Mr. B. — " I have an attorney's license." 

Chan. — " Let me see it 1 [taking it, and eyeing it a moment.] Yes ; 
James Kent — James Kent; 1 signed that. Have you anything else?" 

Mr. B. — " I have a counselor's license." (Producing it.) 

Chan. — " Smith Thompson — Smith Thompson. Yes ; that is his hand- 
writing — I know his signature. Have you anything else V 

Mr. B. — " Not anything." 

Chan. — " Were you ever thrown over the bar V 

Mr. B. — " Not that 1 know of." 

Chan.' — '' W^ell, suppose that I should admit you as a solicitor, and 
that a man were to come to you and wish to commence a suit in chan- 
cery, what would you do ? — what is the first thing ? How would you 
commence V 

Mr. B. — " I would sit down and draw a bill, and copy it, and file a 
copy in the office of the clerk of chancery, and then issue a subpoena, 
and cite the party against whom the suit was commenced to appear 
and answer to it." 

Chan. — " That is right — that is right ; that is exactly the way to 
commence a suit in chancery. I will admit you. You go down to 
Gould's book-store, and get you a blank solicitor's license, and then call 



508 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

on my brother, Moss, who is register, and request him to come down 
with you to my office, and I will admit you." 

All this time the chancellor remained standing behind his table, and 
Mr, B. in the middle of the room. The incident brings out some of the 
peculiar characteristics of both men. 

Three years later he was admitted as counselor, and in 1840 was ap- 
pointed by the Senate of the State of New- York an examiner in chan- 
cery, on the recommendation of Governor Seward. 

He was admitted to practice in the United States courts in 1826, 
while he was member of Congress. 

In 1840 he was appointed Commissioner of United States Loans, 
which office he held three years. He afterward practised as proctor, 
solicitor, counselor, and advocate, in the United States Courts of the 
Northern District of New-York. The people of Broome county, in 
1846, gave an expression of their confidence in Mr. Badger by electing 
him to the office of district attorney for that county. He resigned the 
office in the fall of 1849. 

In politics Mr. Badger is a stanch and decided whig, and on every suit- 
able occasion is ready to defend and advocate the principles and measures 
of his party. He is a man who keeps up with the times. Familiar not 
only with the leading papers that are the acknowledged organs of the 
whig party in this state, but to a considerable extent also with the cur- 
rent literature of the day, Mr. Badger is able to take a comprehensive 
view of the affairs of our country, and to form conclusions more just 
and reliable than most men are competent to do. Among those who 
are best acquainted with him, his opinions are always received with re- 
spect, and the results generally show that the confidence reposed in 
them is not misplaced. 

Mr. Badger was married, in 1811, to a daughter of Mr. John Wells, 
of East Hartford, Conn. Mrs. Badger died in 1845, and he subsequently 
married Mrs. Betsey D. Avery, daughter of the Hon. Davis Dimmock, 
of Montrose, Pa. Judge Dimmock and his family are well known to 
the public. He has, during many years, both before and since he was 
raised to the bench, been a very successful and highly-respected minis- 
ter of the gospel belonging to the Baptist denomination, and, though 
becoming somewhat superannuated, still continues . to preach. His 
daughter, the widow Avery, was, when married to Mr. Badger, a mem- 
ber of the same church with her father, and Mr. Badger has since con- 
nected himself with that denomination. 

Since his union with the Baptist Church, he has made liberal use of 
his property for the support of the various benevolent institutions 
patronized by the denomination, as well as to sustain the ministry in 
the church and congregation of which he is a member. At his house, 
those who were laboring to promote the cause of religion as ministers 
and agents, have often found a welcome and a home. His beneficence 
has not been confined within denominational limits. Being a man of 
strong feelings, and easily moved, he has ever been found ready to re- 
spond to the calls of the needy and deserving, and willing to lend a 
helping hand to all worthy enterprises, so far as consistent with his 
means. 




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HIRAM J. MINBB, OF NKW-YORK. 609 



H. J. MINER, 

OF H. J. miner's bank, AT FREDONIA, NEW- YORK. 

Instruction is often most effectually given by example. Not a few 
men, it is believed, pass their lives in obscurity and want, mainly be- 
cause, from the unfavorable circumstances in which their lives com- 
mence, they pass the period of youth under a vague but general im- 
pression that eminence, in any important respect, is unattainable by 
them ; and hence they form no fixed purpose to attain it. A better 
means of dissipating this delusion, and of rousing the minds of young 
men and lads, in the humbler walks of life, to high and noble aims, and 
of stimulating them to the achievement of such aims, can hardly be 
adopted, than holding before them the example and history of others 
who have pushed their way upward into affluence, honor, and useful- 
ness, from amidst circumstances not less discouraging than their own. 
Impressed with this thought, the writer of the following sketch here 
offers to his readers the example of one who, from a condition of abso- 
lute poverty, with all its attendant embarrassments, and having no 
family distinction or influential friends to help him, has, by his own 
patient and persevering exertions, passed from his early penury through 
competence up to opulence, acquiring by the way increasing respect 
and esteem by men, and living apparently in favor with God, until 
now, in the meridian of life, from the position of one of the most pros- 
perous bankers in the country, he is able to look back on his path, 
strewed with achievements, which are alike honorable to himself, satis- 
factory to his friends, and useful to society. 

Our subject, now the president and sole proprietor of " H. J. Miner's 
Bank of Utica," located in Fredonia, New- York, is descended from an 
obscure but respectable ancestry, who, on his father's side, emigrated 
from England, and on his mother's side, from Wales. The former 
came to America about the year 1700, and settled soon after in Wood- 
bury, Ck)nnecticut, and the latter, about fifty years earlier, came and 
settled in Weymouth, Massachusetts. His mother was the daughter 
of Rev. Ebenezer Jones, a Baptist clergyman, who, for his third wife, 
married, in 1779, a widow, by the name of Quithel. In the early part 
of the Revohition she resided on Long Island, where she lost her former 
husband, and where, being a whig in principle, and having espoused 
the cause of her country with marked decision, she, like many others 
of similar spirit, suffered much privation and sacrifice. At length, to 
escape the dangers of a battle then raging between the Americans and 
English, she was compelled to relinquish all, and fly with her little 
children, and such valuables only as she could bear away in her apron. 
With these, she betook herself to a little boat, and afterwards landed 
at Stonington, Connecticut. Here she became acquainted with, and 
married Rev. Ebenezer Jones. Soon after their marriage they re- 
moved from Stonington to Stephentown, New-York. By this woman 
Mr. Jones had two children, Matthew and Eunice. Matthew is now a 
Baptist clergyman, in Stephentown, having succeeded to his father's 



610 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

pastorate ; and Eunice became the wife of John Miner, and mother of 
him who is the subject of the present sketch. She was a woman of 
active and clear mind, remarkable for patience, perseverance, and hope, 
combined with mildness and amiability of temper, and withal, a de- 
cided and exemplary Christian. She died in Westmoreland, New- 
York, October 30, 1836, at the age of fifty-five years. 

John Miner, the father of Hiram J., was the son of Timothy Miner, 
a deacon of the Congregational church in Woodbury, Connecticut, who, 
by his first wife, had four sons, Judson, Gerry, Treat, and John ; and three 
daughters, Betsy, Mary, and Anna ; and by his second wife, three sons and 
one daughter. One of these latter sons, Timothy, became an Episcopal 
clergyman, and recently died in the city of New- York. John, the youngest 
son, by the first wife, was born in Woodbury, August 29, 1776. 
Having lost his father in boyhood, he enjoyed very small advantages 
for education, and was early apprenticed to the carpenter's trade, which 
occupation he continued to follow through life. His marriage with 
Eunice Jones took place in Stephentown, October, 1801. By her 
he had four sons and four daughters, viz. : Eunice, Hiram, John, Isaac, 
Eliza, Mary, Caroline, and Heman, all of whom, except Mary, who 
died in infancy, are now living, married, and members of Christian 
churches. Although Mr. Miner was a man of good natural abilities, 
much decision and energy of character, and commanded a large share of 
public influence for one in his condition, yet he was not without serious 
faults, owing, however, in a great measure to the faults of his time. 
Butwhatever were his errors in practice, the precepts which he enjoined 
on his family were always those of integrity, morality, and reverence 
for religion. Possessed of a generous and social disposition, his earn- 
ings were not always husbanded wisely, and. as a natural consequence, 
he was unstable in his residence, and always poor. He died of cholera, 
in Westmoreland, New- York, August 22, 1835, aged fifty-nine years. 

Hiram J.* Miner, whose biographical sketch we purpose now to give, 
is the eldest son of John ^Miner, and was born in Stephentown, Rensse- 
laer county, New-York, 1804. The sun of his existence arose under a 
cloud of temporal adversity, from which it did not emerge until after 
he had begun to act for himself under his own direction. The effect of 
his father's poverty he often sorely felt during the period of his mi- 
nority ; and yet, by throwing him upon his own energies, and denying 
him the supports of voluptuous indolence or the means of youthful ex- 
travagance which many sons of the rich possess, it led him to the forma- 
tion of those stricter habits which, in a great degree, have constituted the 
basis of his eminent success. 

In order to give the reader a proper view of his early life, and of the 
disadvantages and embarrassments out of which he has arisen, as well 
as to elucidate his natural traits of character, it will be necessary briefly 
to trace the family of his father while he remained connected with it. 

In 180G, when Hiram was two years of age, his father removed from 
Stephentown to Hamilton, Madison county, New-York, and thence in 
1808, to Westmoreland, Oneida county. Just before the family removed 
from Hamilton, when about four years old, Master Hiram met with 

♦ The 'J. is inserted by himself, as the initial of Jones, his mother's name. 



HIRAM J. MINER, OF NEW- YORK. 511 

an accident which nearly cost him his life. In attempting to ascend 
the rude ladder by which the chamber of their log-house was to be 
reached, the adventurous boy lost his hold and fell from the top. He 
alighted on one of the cooking utensils, which laid open his nose longitu- 
dinally to the bone, and was taken up senseless, supposed to be dead. But 
medical aid w^as soon procured, and the little sufferer was again restored. 

Whilst Mr. Miner resided in Westmoreland, which was some seven 
years, Hiram was accustomed to attend the district school during the 
summer terms, but in winter he remained at home on account of the 
distance of the school from his father's residence. He was at first a 
dull scholar, although abundantly capable of making rapid progress. 
Full of the amusement afforded by his mischiefs, he had no disposition 
to fix his mind on the unexciting pages of his book. Fun was his de- 
light and his principal aim. And yet, his experience proved to him even 
then that " the way of the transgressors is hard." Abundance of chastise- 
ments made him more familiar with the lessons of the rod than with 
the lessons of his book ; and he was rapidly becoming a most trouble- 
some member of the school fraternity, when an incident occurred which 
wholly changed his character as a pupil. This was when he was about 
six years of age. On a certain day, as the school-dame was preparing 
to administer his accustomed discipline, she remarked with a somewhat 
impatient gravity, " I expect to have to lick this boy every day, as regu- 
larly as the day comes. " That is true," replied Hiram to himself, 
mentally — "That is true, and it shall be so no more. I will do better, ^^ 
And from that hour he did "do better," and thereafter became a very 
respectable inmate of the school, and in some of the departments of 
study he surpassed others much older and at first more promising than 
himself 

It was about two years after this, at the age of eight, when the idea 
and the purpose of becoming a merchant first took possession of his 
mind — a purpose which he never relinquished until it was accomplished. 
In company with his parents he had gone from Westmoreland to Au- 
gusta to see the elephant. While there, his father handed him his snuff- 
box with a penny, and directed him to go to a store and get a penny's 
worth of snuflf. He took the box and the penny, and entering Chan- 
dler's store, purchased the snuff. While standing there in waiting for 
the article, the thought came into his mind, which he instantly formed 
into a resolve, and he said to himself, '■'■ I will be a merchant.'''' From 
that moment it became, until it was realized, his ruling desire and aim 
to enter a store as a merchant's clerk. 

Mr. Miner, at this time, and during the war with England, lived on 
the "Seneca turnpike," a route much traversed by the troops going 
west or east ; so that Hiram had frequent opportunities of seeing them 
and of feeling the inspiration of their military display and their reported 
exploits, as well as of listening to the tale of British aggression and 
British barbarity. His father was of the war party, and in these cir- 
cumstances the lad naturally acquired a strong bias in favor of the po- 
litical principles which were then in the ascendant, and has continued 
a firm democrat ever since. 

After the ratification of peace, as soon as th^ fact was known, Mr. 
Miner with his family set off for " the Holland Purchase," then regarded 



512 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

as " the far wesC Their destination was the township of Sheldon, 
Genesee county, (now Wyoming county,) New- York. The journey 
was long and tedious, occupying nearly a month, and was attended 
with much expense, not a little peril, and some disaster. The Gene- 
see River at that time overflowed all its banks, and was crossed at 
great hazard. On leaving the ferry they were obliged to pass over 
meadows buried so deeply in the water that for a considerable distance 
the loaded wagons were upborne and floated. They however suc- 
ceeded in crossing and passed on to Sheldon, where they arrived March 
21. 1815. 

Here Mr. Miner " took up" an entirely new lot of land, covered with 
a heavy Genesee forest, and on it hastily erected a rude log-house, in 
which ho placed his family, and commenced the labor of " clearing." 
Hiram was now eleven years of age. But young as he was he entered 
with his flither on the work of removing the forest with zeal, and 
energy, and hope. He was valiant in felling the trees ; cutting, and 
piling, and burning the brush ; " niggering off" the logs, &c., &c., 
anticipating the day when, instead of the dark forbidding woods, he 
should look upon clear and well-fenced fields, dressed in richest green ; 
and upon waving meadows, golden harvests, and thriving herds. Often, 
during the three years of their residence in Sheldon, these visions of 
hope would dance before the imagination of the boy, and fire his zeal, 
and stimulate his courage, and fortify his patience to meet and endure, 
or surmount, the almost incredible trials and hardships which befel 
him there. 

Those who remember the severities which rested on the new settle- 
ments of Genesee during the years 1816 and 1817, on account of the 
frosts and consequent scarcity of provision, will be the better pre- 
pared to appreciate the sufferings of this family of pioneers in that part 
of the state during " the cold seasons." The subject of this sketch has 
said to the writer that what he was there compelled to witness and to 
suffer left an impression on his mind never to be forgotten ; and that 
the honest poor man can never fail to excite his commiseration, or to 
find in him a sympathizing friend. 

During the first summer and autumn, Mr. Miner succeeded in clear- 
ing off" a few acres which, in the following spring, were planted mostly 
in com. Then came the frosts of June and July, 1816, and destroyed 
it all, and with it, all visible dependence, or source of hope to the family 
for subsistence through the approaching winter. The protracted and 
expensive journey to the west, the maintenance of his family thus long 
in the woods, and now this cutting off of his crops, effectually stripped 
Mr. Miner of what little means he possessed, and lefthim,with his family 
— then a wife and six children — to the buffetings of poverty in its 
most appalling form — the want of daily br^ad. The succeeding winter, 
and the summer of 1817, was a period of dreadful suflTering to nearly 
all the log-cabin settlers in that new country, and particularly so to the 
family of Mr. Miner. And when, again, the crops of 181?' were also 
destroyed by frost, it threw a shade of gloom over their condition and 
prospects which language fails to express. His little property entirely 
consumed, and all hope of securing a livelihood by clearing off and 
cultivating new land being extinguished, by the continued severity of 



HIRAM J. MINER, OF NEW-YORK. 513 

the seasons, and fearing absolute starvation, Mr. Miner and his family 
were compelled to resort to every honest expedient to maintain sub- 
sistence at all. Sending his children to school was out of the question. 
He could not meet the expense. The boys who were old enough 
wrought for the more favored neighbors for whatever wages they could 
get, and sometimes even for their bread. At one time Hiram and his 
younger brother, John, were employed by a neighboring landholder 
in cutting and piling " under-brush," and in picking up potatoes, at 
twelve and a half cents per day, paid in potatoes, which they would 
carry home at night to feed the rest of the family. Potatoes were 
then worth itova. fifty to seventy five cents per bushel. At other times 
the most profitable expedient was a resort to fishing. Mr. Miner was 
obliged to leave home and search for employment at his trade where- 
ever a day's work could be procured. Often, with his tools on his 
back, he would wander off many miles, and be gone one to two weeks ; 
then bring home upon his shoulders the avails of his labor to feed his 
famished family. His entire earnings for a week he could very con- 
veniently carry home upon his back. While labor was extremely 
low, all kinds of provision were unprecedently high. At some sea- 
sons of the year wheat was worth $3 00 per bushel ; Indian corn, $1 50 
to $2 00 ; and potatoes, $1 00 ; while other provisions bore correspond- 
ing prices. Their own backs were the only beasts of burden ; and 
when a bushel of corn or of wheat was procured, Mr. Miner would 
swing it upon his shoulder, and, along with young Hiram, tramp away 
to " Colonel Verry's mills," and get it ground. Then the boy, taking 
the bran, would set off close upon the footsteps of his father bearing 
the flour, and thread the unbroken forest four miles, to reach the 
hungry ones who waited at home. Sometimes pausing to rest upon 
a log beside the path, the father would cheer up the spirits of the lad 
by relating some stirring incident in his own life, or rouse his hope to 
anticipate future good, by telling what he expected his Hiram would 
yet attain to. 

Hiram had even then not only a strong sense of the straits they were 
in, but also a ludicrous conception of the appearance which his father 
and himself presented in these pedestrian milling excursions. Often 
would he amuse his father with his boyish suggestions for relief At 
one time, on their return from mill, as they sat resting on a log, he pro- 
posed the following improvement in their mode of travel : " Suppose," 
said he, " that you should let me get astride of your grist and ride until 
you become tired, and then you do the same by me — and so we alter- 
nate; and by this means save the time of stopping to rest." Naturally 
of a proud spirit, and stung to the quick by the sense of bitter poverty 
and hardship which this playful thought of the boy awakened, yet sup- 
pressing his emotion and afiecting merriment, he started to his feet, ex- 
claiming: " King Hiram,* shoulder your grist and keep up if you can!" 
— then set off upon a run with " King Hiram" close upon his heels. 
On one occasion, during the summer of 1817, in the absence of Mr. 



♦ The boy was named for Hiram, King of Tyre ; and in his merry moods, his 
father used commonly to call him, " King Hiram." 

33 



514 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

Miner, the family had consumed their last morsel of food ; and Mrs. 
Miner, accompanied by Hiram, went to a neighbor's house two miles 
distant through the woods, in hope of procuring something for herself 
and children to subsist upon for a few days, until her husband should 
return. But she did not succeed; and on returning at night, they found 
that the children, having been without food through the day, had been 
vainly trying to allay the cravings of hunger with bark from the twigs 
of the birch. A pile of denuded brush met them at the door, and told 
too plainly the tale of want within. " That scene," remarks the sub- 
ject of this sketch, in narrating the circumstance to the writer — "That 
scene pierced my young heart, and gave me so strong and vivid a con- 
ception of our situation as it then was, that no distance of time can ever 
efface the impression. It remains before me now, fresh as of yester- 
day." He adds: "During all this period of want, nothing like des- 
pondency was ever discoverable in our parents. My mother, especially, 
was at all times cheerful. However sad she might feel, (and she doubt- 
less had her painful forebodings,) towards her children she was ever 
cheerful and hopeful ; saying often : ' I trust in Providence.' ' Hope 
for the future.' 'All is for the best, and will turn out so at last.' " 

The scarcity of provisions continued. It became almost impossible 
to procure food, even with money. The older settlements were a little 
better off in this respect ; and in these occasionally Mr. Miner could 
procure a little work at his trade. Commonly he would be gone 
a week or more — distant twelve to fifteen miles, and return with what 
he could bring on his back, as mentioned above. The family were, of 
course, kept on the smallest allowance which nature could endure. On 
one occasion Mr. Miner, having been at first unsuccessful in seeking 
employment, was gone longer than the time fixed upon. Mrs. Miner 
had, for the last few days, tasked herself to the utmost to keep up the 
drooping spirits of the children ; and had resorted to every expedient 
to lengthen out the little store of provision. But the appalling time 
came when the last cake was baked, and the last morsel was eaten. 

For severfil days they had been restricted to only a fraction of what 
nature demanded. Again night was coming on. The anxious mother 
gazed long and vainly for relief in her returning husband. No flither^ 
no bread. The children were gathered about the door of the humble 
cabin with piteous looks, and hungry. The younger ones were crying 
for food, and asking, " When will father come?" Mrs. Miner, in her 
extremity, said : " I don't know but we shall perish if he does not come 
soon. Bat we will not give up yet, nor go to bed till we have made 
another effort to get up one more supper. He may possibly be home 
in the morning." She then went to a neighbor's and borrowed six pota- 
toes — all she could get — and returned. The potatoes were buried in 
the hot embers and roasted. A little wheat bran which remained in the 
house was wet with water, and made into a cake and baked. The 
cooking being accomplished late in the evening, and there being no pros- 
pect of other relief that night, the table was set as usual. The roasted 
potatoes, with salt, were distributed to the places of the several children. 
The bran cake occupied the centre of the table ; and beside it stood an 
iron candlestick, bearing a hemlock knot lighted for the occasion. 
When all was ready, the family took their seats at the table with usual 



HIRAM J. MIKER, OF NEW-YORK. 515 

formality. The knot candle threw up a dingy flame, with a cloud of 
black curling smoke, which found egress through the open gable, as no 
chimney was there. The pitchy light shed a sombre hue upon the 
table, and on all around. It was a melancholy scene, and felt to be such 
by every member of that suffering group. For a moment, all sat in 
mute and motionless solemnity, contemplating the sad spectacle. Pre- 
sently the silence was broken by the mother in a subdued and plaintive 
tone, " Oh, la me ! this is poverty indeed !" At that instant the light 
went out; and the next, a roar of laughter broke from every child — 
each at the same time grasping and devouring his potato in the dark. 
When the light was again restored, nothing appeared on the table but 
the bran cake. This was served around the board in dubious suspense 
in regard to its fate. To eat such a thing had not been attempted 
by them before. The trial was made, but it was impossible. They 
could not swallow it. A cake of sawdust could have been eaten as 
well. "Itwould have required," says Mr. Miner, '■'■ a force-pump to get 
it into our stomachs." So, the remainder of the repast was abandoned, 
and all went to bed ; when the children, at least, forgot in sleep their 
hunger for that night. Early the next morning the father returned with 
his usual bag of flour or meal, and relieved the distress of that 
occasion. 

It often happened that Hiram was sent several miles with a few shil- 
lings to purchase articles for the family, and in these excursions he was 
generally accompanied by his brother John. At one time, the boys 
were dispatched to a distance of some two miles to make a trifling pur- 
chase, and arrived at their destination just as the family were taking 
their dinner. The lads were kindly asked to sit by and dine with 
them. But Iliram modestly declined, saying, he thought it was '■^ not 
worth while ;'''' or, as John would have it, ''not sojile ;'''* and was pro- 
ceeding to thank the gentleman for his kindness, while John had doffed 
his hat and was down at the table long before Hiram had finished his 
speech. Then, as a matter of course, Hiram had to yield and accept 
the invitation. We mention this to show that, hungry and faint as he 
then was, he did not feel at liberty to accept the hospttality of this 
family without, at least, manifesting some modesty in its acceptance. 
After dinner, the boys paid for the articles they had purchased and re- 
turned home. John gave his version of the adventure, and Hiram his; 
but to this day, if Hiram makes objection to a proposition from one of 
his brothers, he is met with " I suppose you think it 'not soJiU.^'" 

Soon after this, the condition and prospects of the family, as regarded 
food, began to brighten. Mr. Miner obtained regular employment at 
his trade in Attica, some 12 to 15 miles distant, whence flour and 
other provisions were sent, or brought by himself as often as he return- 
ed home. 

Hiram was now 13 years old, and was frequently employed in the 
transportation of supplies from Attica to his father's house. He would 
work for a neighbor a week or more, to pay for the use of a horse, then, 
ride to Attica and return with flour and other provisions. Much of 



* A blunder of articulation occasioned bv his embarrassment. 



516 ' SKJETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

the way was only what was called " a woods road" — a narrow pass 
opened through the forest by clearing away the underwood wide enough 
for a wagon-path. And he did not always escape disaster, from the 
narrowness of the road. On one occasion, as he was returning home 
with 60 pounds of flour, and some other articles, upon his horse's back, 
the road being rough and the mud deep, the animal was quite disposed 
to sheer from the main track, in many places, to avoid the difficulties 
of the way. Hiram felt the danger to which these sidelong plunges 
exposed him, and for the most part managed his rein with becoming 
caution. But it happened, in an unguarded moment, that his fastidious 
steed, spying an unlovely-looking mud-hole, darted sideways and 
brought up against a tree. The unfortunate concussion tore a hole in 
the bag, and cast both rider and grist into the mud. It was a cruel ca- 
tastrophe ; but the young hero was equal to the emergency. He had 
held fast the rein, and thus prevented the horse's escape, but how to se- 
cure and replace on his back the half-buried grist was now the question. 
He was small, and of a light frame, and to lift the bag by main strength 
and put it upon the animal was impossible. He was in the centre of a 
dense forest, five miles from home, and to wait for some passer-by 
seemed preposterous. He therefore resolved on a desperate effort to 
help himself. Putting forth all his strength, he dragged the bag of flour 
from the mud, and stopped the breach by crowding in leaves and small 
twigs. Next he led his horse up beside a high log and made him fast 
to the limb of a tree ; then, with much labor, he succeeded in getting 
the bag on the log, and thence upon the back of the horse. He was 
soon mounted again, and completed the journey without further mishap. 
But both the bag of flour and his own apparel very distinctly proclaim- 
ed that he had been "in the ditch." 

During his father's residence in Sheldon, Hiram, though so young, 
was made practically familiar with all the varieties of labor, as well as 
all the hardships and privations incident to a new country. He was 
employed at intervals in the various processes of clearing new lands — 
chopping, piling and burning logs and brush ; in riding horse to plow 
out newly-cltared fields of corn — the roots and stumps every few rods 
jerking him nearly off the animal's back ; in gathering and boiling the 
sap of the maple in the manufacture of sugar ; in attending upon pits of 
burning charcoal ; in peeling bark for the roofs of log-houses ; in pound- 
ing out buckwheat in the open fields ; in gathering ashes, and manufac- 
turing black salts and potash. He was always ready and willing to 
engage in any honest employment which promised remuneration — es- 
teeming no work unworthy of him which needed to be done. In this 
manner he acquired an interest and a sympathy in the employments of 
the laboring poor which has characterized him in all his subsequent 
life, and materially helped to make him what eminently he appears to 
be — the virtuous poor man's friend. His opportunities for schooling 
in this place were very limited, being restricted to a part of one winter 
and one term of summer. The privilege of attending religious meet- 
ings and listening to the gospel was seldom enjoyed. Once in a great 
while he heard a sermon from some traveling missionary ; but his reli- 
gious instruction was chiefly derived from his mother. She did not fail to 
urge on her children, above everything else, the duty of reverencing the 



^ 



HIRAM J. MINER, OF NEW-YORK. 517 

authority of God, and of looking by faith to the Saviour, who died for 
sinners, and rose again. She taught them to be honest in word and ac- 
tion, true to each other, and kind to all. And she promised that, if 
Providence spared their lives, they should yet rise from their present 
condition, and become respected and esteemed among men. This 
pledge she gave them, confiding in the words of Christ, " Seek first the 
kingdom of God, and his righteousness, and all these things shall be 
added unto you." And before her death, she was permitted to see her 
assurances to them becoming literally fulfilled, especially in the case of 
her eldest son. 

Early in the winter of 1817-18, Mr. Miner, having sold out in Shel- 
don, removed with his family into the township of Attica, four miles 
south from the village of that name. Here, in the neighborhood of 
" Cotton's Mills," on the Tonawanda Creek, he occupied a log-house, 
surrounded by forest. He remained in this place through the winter; 
and in the spring of 1818, having secured the job of building a house 
for Dr. Disbrow in the village, he removed his family thither. 

During the winter at " Cotton's Mills," Hiram was variouHy em- 
ployed as occasion required — sometimes cutting and hauling to the door, 
on his hand-sled, the necessary fuel ; sometimes making and furnishing 
to the market birchen splint brooms; often ranging, for one purpose or 
another, over the snow-clad hills, or penetrating the deep forests ; some- 
times on snow-shoes, and accompanied by his brother John. In these 
rambles they had frequent opportunity of trying their speed and prov- 
ing their prowess in pursuit of the deer — a privilege which they never 
failed to improve when the snow was deep and its crust sharp, as was 
often the case during the winter and early spring. In such circum- 
stances, though destitute of fire-arms or other effective weapons, if they 
saw a deer, they were ever ready to give him chase. Hiram was the 
master spirit, but John was resolute to follow wherever Hiram would 
lead. As a specimen of their daring and unyielding perseverance, let 
the following incident be related : 

Hiram was now in his fourteenth year, and John in his twelfth. One 
morning about sunrise — the boys having just arisen — as Mrs. Miner 
was commencing her preparations for breakfast, on opening the door she 
called out : "Here, boys, are two deer before the door, walking in the 
road; and they move very slow, as if they were tired." The boys 
rushed to the door ; and, on seeing them, the deer plunged into the 
deep snow, and soon disappeared in the thick forest. Hiram stepped 
back to the table, and seizing a large butcher-knife, said to John : 
" Come on, my boy, let us give chase." John was ready at the word, 
and instantly they were off at the top of their speed. The crust of the 
snow was sufficient to bear up the boys ; while the deer, when kept on 
the bound, sank through to the bottom at every leap. The underwood 
being so thick, the boys did not come in sight of the animals but once, 
until they had run the distance of five miles. But now the deer were 
so hard pressed by the young pursuers that, leaving the woods, they 
sought refuge in an adjacent barn-yard among the cattle. But they 
were riot long permitted to pause, before the furious sportsmen were 
rushing upon them. Again they took to the woods. At this place the 
boys were joined in the pursuit by the farmer with his rifle But after 



518 6k:etches of eminent Americans. 

accompanying them a few miles, he gave out, and returned home. Not 
so the lads. Only one thought filled their minds. They started with 
the purpose to catch and kill one or both of these deer ; and until that 
was accomplished, they could think of nothing else. They kept on the 
trail, coming every now and then in sight of their objects; when, 
although they expected soon to have a knock-down fight with the 
beasts, they would brandish the butcher-knife, and with new vigor 
press on — resolved to hazard a battle, whatever might be the event. 
At length one of the deer, in passing under a fallen tree which 
laid somewhat elevated from the ground, was wounded by a sharp pro- 
jecting knot which penetrated the flesh so as to bring blood. Thii^ 
gave the boys new hope. Very soon after, the animals parted, taking 
diflferent directions. The fierce pursuers chose the trail of the wounded 
beast — distinguished by its bloody track. Onward they rushed, with all 
their remaining strength. It was now late in the afternoon. Although 
the race had been most of the time in a dense forest, they had kept their 
reckoning so as not to get lost, and were encouraged by perceiving that 
the creature was taking a course towards their home. At length he began 
to flag from fatigue, and made for a clearing about two miles from their 
father's house. As he neared the open field, he was seen by a man 
armed with a rifle, and was shot. The boys were only a few rods be- 
hind, ignorant that any one was near until they heard the crack of tho 
rifle. They came up and looked on the deer for a few moments, feel 
ing a little chagrined that they had not been permitted to fight and kill 
him themselves; but in the main satisfied — the beast was dead. Then, 
faint and. exhausted with fatigue and want of food, they hastened home, 
much to the relief of their anxious mother, who had feared they were 
lost and would perish in the snow. But the boys were proud of their 
feat. They had, indeed, been from seven o'clock in the morning until 
four in the afternoon, without breakfast or dinner, in a furious race 
through the dark woods ; but they had accomplished their object ; and 
until that was eflfected, they would not give up. 

Illustrative of the same trait of character — stopping at no difficulty 
and shrinking at no hardship in the pursuit of an object once fixed upon 
— let another scene of boyhood be presented. Sometime in the autumn 
following the occurrence related above, while the family were living in 
the village of Attica, there was a cattle show and fair held in Batavia, 
twelve miles distant. Hiram and John desired to see it. It was, 
to be sure, a good way off"; and they had no horse, or money, or 
shoes for their feet. But, despite the obstacles, the expedition was re- 
solved on. Accordingly, on the morning of the appointed day, they set 
off", in pedestrian style, bare-footed, and with not a sixpence in their 
pockets — their only resource for the expenses of the journey being a 
" Barlow knife." On arriving at Batavia, they sold the knife for 
twelve and a half cents. This fund they spent — a penny at a time — 
through the course of the day, in obedience to the demands of ap- 
petite; and returned at night with merry hearts, to relate to the 
younger children the adventures they had had, and the sights they had 
seen. 

The next winter, 1818-19, Hiram was at school. An opportunity was 
oflfered him to board in the family of Harvey Putnam, Esq., of Attica, 



HIRAM J. MINER, OF NEW-YORIC. 519 

where, by working mornings and evenings, he could pay for both his 
board and tuition. This was a privilege which he gladly embraced ; and 
he made rapid progress in study, under the instruction of Mr. (now Rev.) 
Asa Mahan, late president of Oberlin Collegiate Institute, Ohio. Here 
he commenced the study of English grammar; and particularly distin- 
guished himself in spelling ; — having mastered DaboFs arithmetic the 
previous winter by himself at home. During this winter, an accident 
occurred in which, almost as by miracle, he escaped instant death. 
While he was at school one day, and out with the boys during a recess, 
an ox team attached to a sled passed along, and the boys all jumped on. 
The driver applied his whip to the lads, when Hiram leaped from the sled 
into the path. Just at that moment, a span of horses and sleigh, filled 
with men fresh from a neighboring tavern, were rushing by at full speed. 
Instantly he was struck by the horses and thrown down, the team pass- 
ing directly over him. With perfect presence of mind he hugged the 
ground as closely as possible, so as to let the beams of the sleigh pass 
over him. But just as he came under the roller, the team was stopped ; 
and he crawled out from the heels of the horses but slightly wounded, 
to the great joy of his terror-stricken companions. As he rose to his 
feet, the intoxicated driver, with an oath, demanded what he was there 
for. Hiram bowed with a grateful heart, thanking the wretch for not 
killing him outright ; then took his seat in the school-room, bathed in 
tears, and overflowing with gratitude to his Maker that his life was 
spared. The serious impression produced by this narrow escape from 
death continued with him during the remainder of the school. 

The removal of Mr. Miner's family into the village of Attica made 
an important change in the condition, views, and manners of Hiram. 
Instead of the retiring bashfulness of a backwood's lad, he here ac- 
quired the more easy and familiar manners of a village boy. He was 
brought more into contact with men and things; found new oppor- 
tunities for gaining information ; and his knowledge of the world about 
him became essentially enlarged. During the /o?;?- years of his father's 
residence in that place, he enjoyed his best and last advantages for 
schooling. The first two winters he was enabled to attend school 
steadily, and also a part of the third. And here it was that he com- 
menced his operations in moneij-mak'mg. He says to the writer, " The 
first money that I recollect of earning, and laying aside as my own, 
was gained in the following manner : the teacher of our school offered, 
that if I would make the morning fires during the winter, I might have 
the ashes for my pay. I did so ; and in the spring had collected some 
ten or twelve bushels, which I sold at twelve-and-a-half cents per bushel, 
and received my cash all at once, which I thought was a inetty large 
inUr At the age of sixteen he left school altogether, and with many 
regrets. Yet, for a long time after, he did not entirely abandon the 
hope that, in some way, he might be permitted to resume his studies. 
But in this hope he was disappointed. His time and services were re- 
quired by his father in helping to support the family. 

During his continuance in Attica, when not in school, Hiram was 
occupied in every variety of labor that could be turned to best account. 
He assisted his father in house-building, shingling, painting, and other 
light work ; cultivated land on shares ; hired out to farmers at twenty- 



520 SKKTCHBS OF EUINENT AMERICANS. 

five cents a day; wrought in the "brick-yard; ground "bark in the 
tannery, &c., &c. On one occasion, when the mail-carrier was sick, he 
was employed to transport the mail on horseback between Attica and 
Buffalo, a distance of forty miles, and much of the way through the 
woods. His compensation for performing this trip was ffty cents, 
paid in advance. But, unfortunately, from the jolting of the horse — a 
hard trotting one — the money in some way, as was supposed, bounded 
from his vest pocket, and was lost. Consequently he returned minus 
the fifty cents, and had the pleasure and the pounding of the trip to re- 
ward him for his services. And the pounding part he thought was by 
no means inconsiderable, for he was so bruised by the ride of eighty 
miles, on the back oi such a horse, in the heat of summer, that it was 
a full week before he was able to go out again to his usual labor.* 
And yet his visit to Buffalo had in it much to interest the mind of such 
a stripling in his early teens. The village at that time contained 
about 110 houses, and exhibited in strong features the traces of the 
British fire of 1813. He left the mail at the post-office, near a comer 
of the public square, on which the first Presbyterian Church now 
stands, and put up at a hotel, in what was then the upper part 
of the town, nearly opposite to where the "American" now is. 
Having arrived early in the afternoon, he walked out to see the 
wonders of the place. Passing the ruins on the site of the fire, where 
still were naked walls and chimneys standing, he went down to the har- 
bor, and there, on the lake and in the creek, had his first view of the 
great sloops. He also cast a look of indignant scorn over upon His 
Majesty's dominions, lying in the distance across from Black Rock. 
After gazing as long as he wished, swelling with haughty contempt, 
and bidding defiance to the hated enemies of his country, with a proud 
step and excited brain he returned to his hotel for the night, and the 
next morning at six o'clock was off" for home. 

While in Attica he enjoyed access to the village library, at a trifling 
expense, and read many valuable works, which, in some degree, com- 
pensated his feelings for the deprivation of school instruction. And 
oft;en there did he urge his father to procure him a situation as clerk in 
one of the village stores, then kept by Gains B. Rich, Esq., and David 
Scott. His father as often made application for him, but without suc- 
cess, perhaps because the merchants saw nothing of special interest in 
the young aspirant, or perhaps, (which was the more probable reason,) 
because of the want of influential friends. From some cause, other 
young men always filled the vacancies which not unfrequently occurred 
in the stores. But with purpose unflinching, he had made up his mind 
to be a merchant, and he doubted not that sooner or later he should 
attain to the long-desired situation of merchant's clerk. 

The affairs of Mr. Miner being in an unpropitious state, he resolved 
on another change of location. Accordingly, in the winter of 1821-2 he 
removed to Hopewell, Ontario county, leaving Hiram and his eldest 
sister, Eunice, behind. Hiram was engaged to labor for a neighboring 



* It is an interesting fact that, over this same route, between Attica and Buffalo, 
the mail is now transported by steam in about forty minutes. 



HIRAM J. MINER, OF NEW-YORK. 521 

farmer, a Mr. How^e, at S5 per month, for a couple of rcontlif!, to pay- 
some trifling debts whieh his father had left. After completing this 
engagement, he entered into a conditional contract with the same, man 
to labor in his employ one year. The conditions were, that he 
should not be able to secure a clerkship in the time, and bliat he should 
not be called away by his father. His compensation was to be $5 per 
month in winter, and $6 in summer, to be paid in clothing and in live 
stock — cattle and sheep, as he might choose. His plan was to let out 
his stock, lo be returned double in three years, according to the then 
existing custom of the country. Upon the carrying out of this plan he 
set his heart with a good deal of interest, in the expectation of realizing 
something for himself But, after laboring about four months, until 
late in June, his hopes were dashed by a summons from his father to 
come home. He was bitterly chagrined ; but the principle of obedience 
to parental authority was firmly fixed in his creed and in his heart, and 
at once he prepared to obey the mandate, much to the disappointment 
of Mr. Howe and his kind family. After paying the debts, and settling 
for the clothing he had received, about one dollar was paid him in cash, 
to bear his expenses on the way. 

The usual modes of traveling then were, either with one's own horse, 
or else on foot. The latter -was the only means available for Hiram. 
Out of one of his shirts Mrs. Howe constructed a knapsack, into which 
were put his clothing, and two days' provision ; and in the gray of morn- 
ing, staff in hand, he bid the family "good by," and commenced 
the journey. Two miles on his way he called at the place where his 
sister Eunice was stopping. She was looking for him, and met him at 
" the bars." With a laugh she exclaimed, " Why, Hiram ! what a ridi- 
culous appearance you make ! I wonder if you intend to go home with 
that big pack on your back. I am ashamed of your appearance ; and 
what will our folks say ?" He replied : " I have no other means to go. 
They have sent for me, and I can go it." They parted in tears ; she sit- 
ting on the fence, looking after him, until he passed over the hill out 
of her sight. The morning was lovely, and he trudged on over hill and 
valley, ruminating sadly on the past, and nerved up with bright anticipa- 
tions of the future. In his reveries he almost forgot the huge pack, 
which contrasted so strongly with his little body ; and the pedestrian 
efforts he was making ; as, taking off his hat, he wiped away with the 
sleeve of his shirt the perspiration rolling from his brow. The day be- 
came extremely warm, but he faltered not, nor abated his motion till 
the sun stood high in the meridian. Then he paused at an humble 
dwelling, for the purpose of taking his midday meal. As he approached 
the door, the good woman stopped her spinning wheel, while, as politely 
as he knew how, he asked her for a cup of water, and permission to eat his 
dinner in the shade. With an expression of countenance seen only in a 
woman and a mother, she offered him a chair, and then hasted to get him 
the water, which she mingled liberally with milk. He laid off his knap- 
sack, took out and ate his dinner, drank the refreshing beverage, and 
then sat a little time to rest himself He had now traveled nearly 
twenty miles. After about an hour's pause, he thanked the lady for her 
kindness, shouldered his pack, and resumed his journey. The heat was 
exceedingly oppressive, and some of the way was rendered peculiarly 



522 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

wearisome by the deep and burning sand. But he pressed forward, and 
crossed tlie Genesee River just above Geneseo, at the same place 
where, seven and a half years before, he had crossed with his parents in 
movinnr to the West. Instead of the angry flood, covering all its banks 
and the adjacent flats, it was now reduced to a comparatively small 
stream. He descended to the boat, which was in waiting, and the oars- 
man put him across for four cents — no charge for baggage! About sun- 
set he arrived in the village of Geneseo. He had made but one stop 
during the day, and was now tired, and his feet were sore ; and prudence 
seemed to demand that he should here rest for the night. But, as he 
scanned the aspect and dimensions of the hotel, he fancied there was a 
little too much the appearance of style in it for one in his present plight ; 
and learning that there was another public house about two miles fur- 
ther on, he resolved to proceed. 

In Geneseo he inquired for the residence of Gen. Wardsworth, which was 
pointed out ; and at the same time he was told that Mr. Wardsworth 
owned all the adjacent Genesee flats ! As he stood in front of the man- 
sion, he cast a wondering look over the vast flats below, and then again 
upon the house ; and contrasted the condition of the princely proprietor 
with his own humble lot. And he was told that this man of immense 
wealth commenced life comparatively poor. The thought arose in his 
mind, " Is it within the reach of man, by his own exertions, to achieve 
all this ?'' And the example inspired him with new hope, and excited 
the spirit of emulation within him. 

After surveying this scene to his satisfaction, he passed on to the tavern 
two miles ahead. On approaching it, he was gratified to find it bearing 
an appearance of plainness which, in some measure, relieved the embar- 
rassment he felt on account of his own rustic plight. It bore the inviting 
signal, "Traveler's Home." He had now walked forty miles, most of 
the way in a hot sun, and was thoroughly exhausted. He entered the 
bar-room, which was lighted with candles, and nearly filled with trav- 
elers who had stopped for the night, and were sitting around the room on 
rude benches and chairs. With much trepidation he advanced to the bar 
and attempted to speak to the landlord. But his tongue would 
not obey his will in the oflice of articulation. After repeated eflbrts — 
bashfully stammering — he succeeded in making the man understand 
that he wanted lodging for the night. The landlord did not instantly 
answer ; but scanned the youngster from head to foot with a piercing 
eye. If he had stood in the presence of a king, Hiram could not have 
trembled more. After a moment's suspense, he was relieved by the 
landlord's reply, — "Yes, my brave lad, you shall be accommodated?" 
He laid ofT his pack, called for a dish of bread and milk, ate it, and went 
to bed. The next morning he arose early, settled his bill, and at- 
tempted to proceed on his journey. But he found his feet so badly 
swollen and blistered that he could not walk in his shoes. So he took 
them ofl", and bearing them in one hand, with his staff' in the other, and 
his pack on his back, he started again, accompanied by an old man and 
his son who had passed the night at the same house. Occasionally these 
fellow-travelers, with much kindness, would relieve our young hero by 
carrying his pack. When they had come within five miles of Canan- 
daigua, they were overtaken by the mail wagon, and, for twenty-five 



HIRAM J. MINER, OF NEVT-YORK, 523 

cents each, were carried to Blossom's Hotel in the village, ITere young 
Miner parted with his obliging companions ; and replacing his shoes on 
his feet until he had passed out of the village, as he had done in passing 
through other villages during the day, he walked on over the remaining 
nine miles to his father's residence in Hopewell. In passing through a 
pieceof woods within the last six miles, an animal somewhat larger 
than a black squirrel darted across the road just in front of him. He had 
never before seen the like, and knew not what it was. Instantly all the 
boy in him was roused. Forgetting his fatigue, and the soreness of his 
feet, and the burden on his back, he rushed, pell-mell, over the logs, and 
through the brush, in pursuit of the strange creature. On his coming 
up, the animal paused to show fight; and seemed to beckon him on by 
a peculiar wag of its tail. The young assailant then advanced with some 
caution, until he came within reach of his cane. After making several 
feint passes, to try the temper of the animal, which coolly kept its posi- 
tion, he presently dealt the creature a severe blow on the tip of the 
nose. At the instant, a rapid discharge from its magazine convinced 
the aggressor what sort of animal it was; and he beat a hasty retreat. 
Fortunately the fire took effect only on his cane ; which, however, 
afforded decisive proof to his younger brothers, after his arrival home, 
that he had had an inglorious fight with a . 

A little short of his parents' residence, he came where his father was 
building a new house for a farmer. Mr. Miner saw him coming ; and, 
mortified with his appearance, met him at the door to prevent his 
entrance. After the first greeting the fiither said : " How like Satan you 
look ! Come, let us go home." So, taking the sack from the son's 
shoulders, they walked on together ; the father swinging the uncouth 
burthen in his hand, and saying : " This will do for mother's rag-bag ; 
else I would throw it away, with your dinner, clothes, and all." They 
were soon at the lofj-house in which the familv resided. Hiram was 
met by his mother at the door, who greeted him with much maternal 
joy ; and was also warmly welcomed by all the household. Though greatly 
fatigued, and with feet badly blistered and swollen, he was comparatively 
happy in thus meeting with his friends, all in usual health and spirits. 

After a few days of rest, he was out at work again ; either on the land 
occupied by his father, or among the neighboring farmers. In this 
place he commonly attended the Methodist Church on the Sabbath, at 
" the Sulphur Springs" — now " Clifton Springs ;" and felt himself not 
a little dressed up, when clad in his nankeen coat, and nankeen or 
bleached tow pantaloons. 

During this summer his father found opportunity to engage him as 
clerk to Jonathan Mayhew, now of Buflflilo, N. Y., then merchant in 
Manchester, Ontario county, on a salary of 850 for the first year. He 
commenced his clerkship, with a glad heart, in September, 1822, in the 
19th year of his age, and continued with Mr. Mayhew until April, 1824. 
Sometime in the winter of 1823-^, his father removed his family back 
to Westmoreland, and, soon after, Hiram was requested by his parents 
to return also to Westmoreland, and try to get a situation nearer home. 
The inducements for him to remain longer at Manchester were not great. 
Mr. Mayhew was engaged in the cast-iron business, and ii» the manu- 
facture of patent plows, so that his mercantile operations were quite 



624 BKKTCHES OF KMIKINT AMERICANS. 

limited, and did not afford to young Miner all the advantages which his 
ambition desired. He felt, however, that he had no cause of complaint 
or dissatisfaction with his employer. Mr. Mayhew had given him every 
facility to acquire a knowledge of trade, which his business afforded, 
liad taken him from the field, with no recommendation but his appear- 
ance — a retiring, bashful boy, small of stature, and looking much 
younger than he was — and had given him his first lessons in mercantile 
life. He regarded this gentleman as a high-minded, honorable, and up- 
right man, and his wife as one of the most amiable, affectionate, and 
lovely of women. To them and their family he had become strongly 
attached, and the example and instruction which he there enjoyed have 
been happily felt in all his after life. Still he could discover nothing in 
the prospect which promised much advantage in remaining longer with 
his present employer. He felt a strong desire to be in an active and 
extended mercantile house, where he could anticipate future ad- 
vancement This, together with the desire to gratify the wish of 
his parents m being nearer them, determined him to go home and 
stand his chance of better employment. Immediately he acquainted 
Mr. Mayhew and family with his design. Mrs. M. replied that " the 
advice which mothers give should, in general, be obeyed ; but when it 
related to business, she somewhat doubted whether, in all cases, it 
could be done with propriety, since their maternal affection, and desire 
to have their sons near them, were liable to outweigh considerations 
which would otherwise be seen to have the advantage." The force of 
this remark he afterwards strongly realized, as it was nearly three years 
before he again obtained the situation of merchant's clerk ; and he now 
believes that if it had not been for his unalterable determination to be- 
come a merchant, the scenes of the next three years (considering the bu- 
siness which, as he though^ he was compelled to pursue, or do worse — 
with its trial of patience and principle, and the examples it held continu- 
ally before him) would have eventually made him, perhaps, a stage- 
driver, or a common day-laborer, and have thus prepared him to drag 
out a miserable and comparatively useless life. But that determination 
never wavered — that object of his ambition was never lost sight of. 
On all occasions he kept a steady eye to the mercantile business as his 
future employment. 

Agreeably to the request of his parents, early in April, 1824, he left 
Manchester for Westmoreland, and, taking the stage at Canandaigua, he 
arrived at his father's house the next day. As usual, all were 
glad to see him home again, and he enjoyed the merriment for a time. 
But he could not long remain idle. After visiting all his young friends 
and former acquaintances, he became uneasy, and must have something 
to do. For want of better employment, he assisted a Mr. Cushman, an 
innkeeper at Lairdsville, in the post-office and about the house, for a 
few months. At length, failing in every effort to obtain a clerkship, he 
engaged in the employment of H, Y. Stewart, proprietor of the stage- 
house and keeper of the posf>office in Vernon village, Mr. Stewart's 
business was large, and, finding in it active employment, Hiram con- 
tinued in this service about two years. While here he was brought 
into contaQt and association with the very bane of society, and particularly 
with the drinking men of the day. Scarcely did a stage-load of gentle- 



HI&AH J. MINER, OF KEW-TORK. 625 

men arrive, but each, as a matter of course, wanted his glass of brandy, 
gin, or other liquor, at the bar. Besides, it was the custom of the house 
to take a dram on rising in the morning, and again before every meal. 
In all this Hiram shared with the others. He was accustomed to be up 
at all hours of the night whenever the stage arrived, and the cup was the 
remedy for his broken rest. In such circumstances it was almost mira- 
culous that he escaped the dreadful gulf into which so many noble ones 
have fallen ; but a sovereign Providence employed the disgusting ex- 
cesses of others as the means of his deliverance. Commonly, at the first 
peep of day, the sated customers at the bar would be in for their morn- 
ing dram. Among them was one old man in particular, whose appear- 
ance and habits especially affected the mind of Hiram. With trem-bling 
hand he would fill his glass, and greedily swallow its contents. But 
sometimes abused nature would rebel. A sudden convulsion of the 
istomach would hurl back the vile stuff, which the poor old wretch would 
receive again in the tumbler held close to his lips. Then, with counte- 
nance distorted — almost fiendish — rather than lose the horrid draught, 
he would again, the second time, force the filthy poison down. " That," 
says Mr. Miner, " was more than I could bear. Sickened and disgusted, 
/ resolved that thenceforth and forever I would use no more spirituous 
liquors as a beverage, which resolution I have thus far sacredly kept." 

While here in Vernon, he made earnest and repeated eli'orts to ob- 
tain other employment better suited to his inclination and taste, but, as 
usual, without success. In whatever business he was engaged it was al- 
ways his ambition to progress, and strive to reach the highest mark ; 
hence he was always looking out for a more advantageous position. In 
the summer of 1826, through the influence of Hon. John E. Hinman, he 
obtained the situation of bar-keeper in '' Bagg's Hotel," Utica, which was 
* then kept by A. Shepherd. This position he continued to occupy until 
December following, and performed the business of the office to the en- 
tire satisfaction of his employer. While in this place, he had opportu- 
nity to see most of the distinguished men oi the time. The grand cele- 
bration had on the occasion of opening the Erie Canal, took place while 
he was there ; and Governor Clinton, with other prominent men who 
accompanied him on that occasion, put up at this house. The opportu- 
nity thus afforded him of seeing and hearing the great men of tlie age, 
was a privilege which he highly prized, although his employment was 
by no means satisfactory, nor could anything meet his desires which did 
not appear to lie in the direct path of his ambition, and his fixed resolve 
to become a merchant. But his experience in hotel-keeping, considering 
the acquaintance with men and the ways of the world which it afforded, 
although so eminently beset with peril, was not without advantage to 
him, especially if we take into the account the important resolution 
mentioned above, which was formed and confirmed in view of the evils 
he was thus compelled to witness. 

In December, 1826, Mr. Miner, now nearly 23 years of age, made an 
arrangement with Mr. Starr Clark, a merchant at Vernon Centre, now 
of Mexico, New-York, for a clerkship in his store. Gladly did he quit 
the precincts of the hotel for the more congenial employment of mer- 
chant's clerk, even in a country store, and at a much smaller pecuniary 
compensation. He found the change decidedly grateful to his feelings. 



526 SKETCHES OF EMIITENT AMERICANS. 

He was now permitted to resume that employment which was the choice 
and purpose of his heart. Opportunity for reading and meditation was 
ail'orded him, and the Sabbath became to him a day of rest. He applied 
himself closely to the business of the store, and made Mr. Clark's inter- 
est his own. He soon gained the confidence and affection of his em- 
ployer and family, and now says, that he looks back to his stay in that 
family as one of the most agreeable passages in his life. While there, 
under the ministry of Rev. John Barton, of the Presbyterian Church, 
during the great revivals of 1820-7, he became interested in the subject 
of personal religion, and was believed to be spiritually renewed ; and he 
publicly espoused the Christian cause by uniting himself with the Pres- 
byterian Church of that place in 1827. It was there that he became 
acquainted with Miss Adeline M. Hungerford, a young lady whom he 
afterwards married, and who is now his wife. 

Mr. Clark's was an ordinary country retail business, consisting much 
in credit and barter trade, and chiefly confined to the little community of 
Vernon Centre. Consequently it was small, and ill-adapted to satisfy, 
for any considerable time, the aspiring spirit of young Miner. Being a 
man of fine feelings and benevolent heart — one who can hardly do 
enough for his friends — Mr. Clark was willing to forego a personal ad- 
vantage for the sake of serving the interest of his clerk. He had ascer- 
tained the business talents of the young man, as adapted to a larger 
sphere of action, and knowing that he would not long be content to re- 
main in "Vernon Centre, proposed to write to a friend of his in the city 
of New-York, and get a situation for him. He did so ; and in Septem- 
ber, 1827, Mr. Miner visited the commercial metropolis for the first 
time. He remained a few weeks with Messrs. Keeler & Lynes, whole- 
sale merchants in Pearl-street ; and the knowledge he there acquired 
was of much service to him afterwards. But he did not find New- York* 
to be quite what he had fancied it. Failing to get a situation to his 
mind, he returned to Vernon Village, and was employed in the store of 
Messrs. Hitchcock & Stevens, until February, 1828. He then went 
again to New- York, and entered as clerk in»the store of Arthur Tappan 
& Co., then extensively engaged in the silk trade. Here he had a fine 
opportunity for improvement, which he did not fail to take advantage 
of, and turn to the best account, by making himself acquainted with the 
various kinds of goods, their qualities, prices, &c. 

When he engaged for Mr. Tappan, he did it intending to remain a 
long time, and ultimately become a New- York merchant. But after 
carefully calculating the chances between the city and country for a 
poor clerk, without money, or credit, or influential friends, he changed 
his mind, and resolved to make the country the theatre of his enter- 
prise. Hence, while in the city, he was actuated by an earnest zeal to 
acquire knowledge and experience which should aid him in his future 
operations, rather than by any particular interest he felt in city lite. He 
remained with Mr. Tappan through the spring trade, and then left again 
for the country, without knowing, or very much caring, where he 
went, so that he found a position which suited him. Mr. Tappan had 
kindly given him a letter recommending him to the favor of mercantile 
men, which he knew would procure him admittance into any store 
where he could find a vacancy. He first went up into Westchester 



HIRAM J. MINER, OF NEW-YORK. 527 

County ,^ and spent a few weeks visiting an uncle in Tarrytown. Here 
he was invited to the house of Isaac Van Wart, one of the captors of 
the British spy, Major Andre, and enjoyed the satisfection of hearinj; 
the old man rehearse the whole story, which imparted to it fresh aud 
peculiar interest. 

After visiting the different towns along the Hudson River, he pro- 
ceeded by canal to Syracuse, and thence to Oswego. His passage from 
Syracuse to Oswego Falls (now Fulton) was made in the best manner 
which the conveniences of the time afforded, viz. : by a small sail-boat, 
tracing the length of Onondaga Lake, and then down'the Oswego River. 
Sometimes the boat was rowed, and sometimes was drawn with ropes 
by men walking on the river-shore, and sometimes was hurried over 
rapids on a rushing current. But it was, altogether, a delightful pas- 
sage, because so new and wild. From the Falls the stage conveyed 
him to Oswego. 

The first morning after his arrival in Oswego came near to beinw 
made disagreeably memorable to Mr. Miner, by the loss of his little 
earthly all. He had stopped over night at a public hotel, and, on retiring 
to bed, placed his pocket-book, containing every dollar he was worth, un- 
der his pillow, as he was wont. He arose^early 'in the morning, and walk- 
ed out to survey the grounds of the old fort. ' He had not been long out 
before he discovered his error — he had left his pocket-book under his 
pillow. With not a little anxiety he hastened back to his room. The 
chamber-maid was there, just finishing her work. Instantly he inquired 
if she had found a pocket-book. "Which bed did you occupy, sir ?" 
she asked. (There were two in the room.) On his pointing to the one 
he had slept in, she drew the pocket-book, yet unopened, from her 
bosom and presented it to him, saying, " You are a careless fellow." 
He compensated her for the honest act ; and ever after that, when tra- 
veling, it has been his practice, on retiring to bed, if he wished to place 
anything valuable under his pillow, first to enclose it in one of his 
stockings, assuming that none but a crazy man would put on his cold 
boot or shoe, minus the stocking, without knowing it. From that time he 
has never had occasion to hurry back to his room in a hotel to recover 
aught from his bed, nor ceased to remember the admonition of the ho- 
nest chambermaid — " A careless fellow." 

After passing a few days in Oswego, and not feeling altogether satis- 
fied with the appearance of things, he passed on over a fine agricultural 
region, through New-Haven, Mexico, Richland, EUisburg, and Adams, 
to Watertown, the shire town of Jefferson county. In the course of 
this tour his mind was far from being idle. Being a close observer, he 
was all the time gathering an intellectual fund for future use, and sought 
every day to make some profitable advance in knowledge. It was, in- 
deed, a characteristic hahil of his mind to be continually reaching for a 
higher mark in his qualifications for business,* as well as business 
achievements. Whether at home or on a journey, at the desk or be- 



* He assures the writer that in all his changes during the period of his clerk- 
ship, it was-never a question with him what salary he was to receive, but what ad- 
vantages for acquiring a knowledge of business he could enjoy. 



528 SKETCHES OF EMIKENT AMEEICANS. 

hind the counter, his thoughts were ever active, calculating results, 
balancing advantages, estinaating probable value, or counting the 
chances of profit and loss in this or that enterprise, or, while contem- 
plating the present, trying to picture in imagination the improvements 
of the future. 

As he passed through Richland, the magnificent farm of Judge 
Meacham, containing several hundred acres, was pointed out to him, 
with which he was much delighted. It was said to be the largest and 
best farm in that county, and on which the judge at one time made, 
from his own dairy, a cheese weighing 1600 pounds. This cheese Mr. 
Meacham transported to Washington, and presented to General Jack 
son, then President of the United States. 

On arriving in Watertown Mr. Miner put up at the stage-house, then 
kept by D. Hungerford, where he remained incog, for several days. 
He was much pleased with the appearance of the place. Beebee's 
large cotton factory, since destroyed by fire, was then in full operation 
— a noble structure, built of stone from the proximate quarries, from 
which also the material for most of the better class of houses was ob- 
tained. Tills gave them an aspect of strength and durability, espe- 
cially pleasing to such a mind as his. Then there was the almost un- 
limited water-powerf which seemed to promise permanent prosperity 
to the place, surrounded as it was by a rich farming community. On 
the whole, it appeared to him that this was the place for him to stop, 
provided he could get a situation to suit him. He had no acquaint- 
ance in Watertown, but having learned that Silas Clark, a brother of 



t The Black River passes on one side of the village, with its deep and foamin? 
torrent driven along rapids, between high and rocky banks. Near the village, Mr. 
Miner was shown a point of rock projecting over the rapid current, called " Mother 
Whittlesey's Rock," of which the following story was told him by the citizens of 
the village, and, he thinks, by one of the actors in the scene : 

"Sometime during the war of 1812, a man by the name of WTiittlesey, then pay- 
master for troops stationed at Sacket's Harbor, received a large sum of money from 
the government, and on his way to Watertown, professed to have been robbed. 
He exhibited wounds, and his saddle-bags cut, while the money was gone. But 
after a time, strong suspicions began to be entertained that all was not right on his 
part respecting the alleged robbery. The two gentlemen who were his bail, 
Messrs. Fairbanks and Keys, of \\'atertown, at length becoming satisfied of the 
truth, determined upon apian to make him acknowledge the fact, and disgorge the 
money. In a neighboring swamp a pit was dug large enough to submerge a man 
Then the two gentlemen, havins: arranged for a physican to be at hand, under 
pretence of hunting, persuaded Whittlesey to accompany them into the swamp. 
Coming near the pit they seized him and bade him confess the truth, and tell where 
the money was, or they would put him under the mud. He resolutely maintained 
that he was robbed, and denied all present knowledge of the money. They 
thrust him in. But on being withdrawn, he still refused to admit his guilt. Under 
the water again he went. After the operation had been repeated two or three 
times — the last proving almost fatal — he yielded, and said they would find most 
of the money quilted into his wife's under-skirt. Forthwith they repaired to his 
house and demanded the garment, which was then upon the lady's person. It 
was surrendered with its inwrought treasure. But Madam Whittlesey, going 
immediately out, proceeded to the bank of the river, and from this rock threw her- 
self into the furious stream, on which she was seen to float a little distance, and 
then disappeared for ever. From that day the spot has been pointed out to visitors 
as ' Mother Whittlesey's Rock.' " 



HIBAM J. MINER, OF NEW-YORK. 529 

his friend and patron, Starr Clark, was a druggist in that place, he 
sought him out and introduced himself to him, making known his de- 
sire to get a situation in a store. Mr. Clark remembered him with favor- 
able impressions, having seen him in his brother's store at Vernon 
Centre. This, together with letters which he bore from gentlemen in 
New-York and elsewhere, at once excited Mr. Clark's interest in his 
behalf, and he generously invited Mr. Miner to make a home in his 
house until he could secure a clerkship to his mind. Mr. Clark also 
went around with him, and introduced him to various merchants of the 
village. 

In the course of a week Mr. Miner made an arrangement with John 
Safford for a clerkship, at 812 50 per month, with nothing definite as to 
time, leaving it for either to terminate the engagement at pleasure, Mr. 
Safford kept a cash store, and sold for ready pay, thus repudiating both 
barter and credit. It was a novel thing at that time for a country mer- 
chant to hold his goods for cash only ; and especially was it so to our 
young friend, who had always been taught the old-fishioned practice of 
giving six months' credit, the custom then everywhere prevalent, and 
supposed there was no other way for a merchant to get rid of his goods. 
Mr. Safford was nearly the first, if not the very first merchant in north- 
ern New- York who confined his whole trade to cash pay. He kept an 
excellent assortment of goods, and did a respectable amount of business. 
But this selling goods for cash down presented to Mr. Miner a new idea 
altogether. It opened before him an entirely new path of enterprise. 
He could now see plainly, as he thought, the only safe course for him- 
self Prior to this, all had been darkness before him. He felt little 
confidence in the credit system, especially for a young merchant without 
capital or influential friends to back him up. But now all was clear to 
his mind. The cash plan, carried out with industry and energy, pro- 
mised, to his judgment, all success, while only disaster and probablede- 
feat could be seen in the credit system. The course was at once marked 
out, which he firmly resolved to embark in as soon as favoring circum- 
stances would permit. 

Mr. Safford was a fair business-man, careful and honest, but not of 
enlarged views. He marked his goods in common figures, so that his 
customers might see the prices, and from these he would not deviate. 
He relied more on the low prices to sell his goods than on any tact or 
skill in trade. Mr. Miner applied himself closely to the business of his 
employer, and in a few months made himself fully acquainted with it. 
He thought the system capable of being somewhat modified to advan- 
tage. He felt sure that, if Mr. Safford would permit him, in order to 
secure a trade, sometimes to drop a little from the marked price, he 
could guarantee an increased amount of daily cash sales. Mr. Safford 
did not enter into his views, but insisted on a rigid adherence to the one- 
price system. Sometimes, however, the temptation to effect a trade 
was more than the clerk could resist, when, by varying the price a mere 
trifle, he could thereby make a large bill ; but the unbending merchant 
would be always displeased, and often express his disapprobation in no 
pleasant terms, whatever present pecuniary profit might have been 
gained to him. In these circumstances, feeling himself controlled and 
guided in all his movements, like a machine, by these fixed prices, Mr. 

34 



530 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

Miner became restless. lie wanted more space to throw off the pent- 
up steam which was daily gathering force within him, and which only 
needed opportunity in order to bring out the merchant — the man of bu- 
siness. There were many things to attach hini to Watertown. I ts 
location, its advantages for trade, its beauty, and its good society, all 
combined to invite him to remain; but personal activity in business — 
his leading aim — appeared to require a change, and he resolved to leave. 
During his brief residence in Watertown, he attended on the ministry of 
Rev. George S. Boardman, then pastor of the Presbyterian Church in 
that village, and formed many agreeable acquaintances with whom he 
was loth to part; but the time came when he thought it best to go, and 
he could not be detained. 

About this time he had received an offer from John H. Whipple, 
Esq., of Adams, in the same county, which he felt inclined to accept. 
Mr. Whipple was a merchant of high repute. Accordingly, he went to 
Adams, and there made an engagement to become the clerk of Mr. 
Whipple, on the same salary as lie was then receiving. He closed his 
connection with Mr. Safford, and commenced with Mr. Whipple in No- 
vember. 1828. This change proved much to his advantage. He found 
Mr. Whipple all that had been represented, and more — a mer- 
chant of the hrst capacity. He was doing a heavy cash and credit 
business, kept a large and well-selected stock of goods, was always 
on hand and behind the counter, commanded an extensive trade, 
and, although in some respects unstable in his views, was entitled to the 
credit of much sagacity in business, and was, in fact, a scientific and 
practical merchant. In his store Air. Miner made rapid advances, and 
now affirms that, during the six months of his being in Mr. Whipple's 
employ, he gained more valuable information and experience than he 
ever did before or since in the same length of time. The example of 
neatness and order, and the perfect arrangement of his goods, and of 
other things in and about the store, was especially pleasing to Mr. 
Miner, and what he ever after imitated, or tried to improve upon, in his 
own business pursuits. Here he attended on the ministry of Rev. John 
Sessions, of the Presbyterian Church, and united with the church in that 
place by certificate fjom the church in Vernon Centre. 

In the spring of 1829 Mr. Miner made an arrangement with a new 
firm opening in Adams, Messrs. Doxtater & Burch, for one year, at a 
salary of $150. In this firm, although the partners were men of capital, 
neither of them was acquainted with mercantile operations, and they 
therefore needed an experienced clerk. This was a grand opportunity 
for Mr. Miner. He could now move comparatively untrammeled. 
After due preparation, he went to New-York, in company with Mr. 
Burch, one of the partners, and purchased a stock of goods. The usual 
spring freshets that season had considerably damaged the canal, and de- 
layed transportation. Large quantities of goods were piled upon the 
wharves and in the store-houses at Troy, awaiting the opening of the 
canal ; consequently the goods of many merchants were delayed several 
weeks before thoy could be got out. This firm of Doxtater & Burch being 
a new one, and, considering their competition, they felt it to be especially 
important to get their goods in town first. It was therefore decided that Mr. 
Miner should repair to Troy, and attend to the re-shipment and forward- 



HIRAM J. MINER, OF NEW-YORK. 631 

ing of the goods. Accordingly he went, and, after all necessary inquiry, 
he could see no prospect of getting them on short of many days, and 
perhaps weeks. He was advised by the forwarders to go home, and 
assured that th'i goods would go on as soon as if he remained. But 
"No," said he, "I am going to stick to you until I see them in the 
canal-boat, and going up the canal, too." He then went and engaged 
his board by the week; and from early morning until late at night he 
was on the dock for nine days before all the packages were out of the 
different tow-boats. While the goods of most other merchants as they 
were taken out went into the store-houses, Mr. Miner had those of Dox- 
tater & Burch piled on the dock, and covered with an awning at night. 
For a few shillings put into the hands of one or two of the dock men, 
all his wishes wore readily attended to. When at last he saw the 
goods all safely lodged in a canal-boat, he, too, stepped on board, and 
accompanied them as far as Schenectady, when he took the stage and 
hastened on to Adams. The result was, Messrs. Doxtater & Burch re- 
ceived their goods from three to five weeks in advance of every other 
merchant of that place or its neighborhood, although the others had gone 
to the city ahead of them. That fact gave them a start in trade, which 
the firm continued afterwards, in a great measure, to maintain. This 
was Mr. Miner's first mercantile exploit where he had the direction of 
his own efforts. The result exceeded the highest anticipations of his 
employers, and they gave him due credit for unusual perseverance in 
the matter. 

In the course of the season competition became sharp between the 
merchants. Good customers were watched for as they came into the 
village, and goods were put down to the smallest profit, and sometimes 
to about cost. All this required much activity and no little skill to 
keep the lead in trade, and was well calculated to bring out the hitherto 
unseen talents of the young head clerk, whose diminutive stature and 
juvenile aspect had always stood in the way of his proper appreciation. 

Mr. Miner's efforts in the employ of Doxtater & Burch placed him 
several rounds higher up the ladder, and he now began to think serious- 
ly of acting more immediately for himself, by doing business on his 
own account. Consequently, at the close of this year he began to write 
to persons in various places, making inquiries in order to fix upon a pro- 
per location. Among others, he corresponded with Rev. Lewis H. 
Loss, then pastor of the congregational church in Camden, Oneida 
County. He had formerly been acquainted with Mr. Loss at Vernon 
Centre, during the great religious revival there in 1826. At that time, 
while his attention was thoroughly awakened to the subject of religion, 
Mr. Loss held a long conversation with him ; and, although he was full 
of cavil, the apparent solemnity of the Rev. gentleman, his frank and 
pungent remarks, and his obvious kindness of purpose, disarmed the 
young man, and, under the Divine Spirit, did much towards deepening 
those convictions for sin which issued in his hopeful conversion to Christ. 

Mr. Loss readily interested himself in the matter ofMr. Miner's com- 
munication ; and replied that, in his opinion, Camden was a good point 
— one where trade could be secured for 20 miles in nearly every direc- 
tion. He believed that a cash store was just what was needed to concen- 
trate the trade ; and that if a merchant of the right stamp were to come 



532 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

in and put forth appropriate efforts, a large and profitable business 
might be secured. And, moreover, he believed Mr. Miner was exactly 
the right man for such an enterprise. He stated further, that he had 
conversed with Dea. Upson, a gentleman who, in connection with the 
tin and sheet-iron business, was selling a few dry goods ; and had re- 
ceived a proposition for the rent of his room and the purchase of what 
goods he had on hand, and concluded by inviting Mr. Miner to come 
and look at Camden, and put up at his house. 

In March, 1830, Mr. Miner left Adams, taking letters of recommen- 
dation to New-York merchants from Doxtater & Burch ; and on his way, 
called for a few days in Camden, stopping with his clerical friend, Mr. 
Loss. While there, he made an arrangement with Dea. Upson for the rent 
of his shop, and the purchase of his goods, on condition that, after visiting 
other places, he should finally fix upon and send his goods to Camden. 
There were many of the citizens who thought the enterprise a visionary 
one, since the farmers were mostly poor and could not trade, as was sup- 
posed, unless they could pay for goods in rye, Indian corn and lumber, 
which constituted the staple produce in and around Camden. But Mr. 
Miner felt sure as to what would be the effect of low prices upon the farm- 
ing community, since goods were sold by the merchants then in business 
at high rates, and mostly on credit, payable in farming produce and 
lumber. 

Having made this arrangement in Camden, Mr. Miner passed on 
to Vernon Centre, After paying his addresses to the young lady who, 
not long afterwards, became that to him witHout which man is of little 
worth, and consulting with his friends, particularly with Mr. Clark, he 
visited other places in the southern part of Oneida County and in Ma- 
dison County, without finding any location which offered greater at- 
tractions than Camden. He therefore finally fixed upon that as the 
place of beginning. After collecting a little money which was due him 
in Vernon, he found himself able to command in all $270. This was 
tiis entire capital with which to commence mercantile business alone, 
and with no one to whom he could look for help in case of misfortune. 
Thus was he thrown emphatically upon his own resources ; which, so 
far as related to money, were meagre indeed. But the time had ar- 
rived. He was now to launch his little barque on an uncertain and 
often stormy sea, where breakers threatened on every hand ; without 
pilot or crew, but guided by integrity and impelled by industry. Mr. 
Clark gave him a letter to Charles Underbill, head clerk of "Jagger& 
Rathbone," merchants in Maiden Lane. Before leaving Vernon, he called 
on Messrs. Hitchcock & Stevens, who also gave him letters of intro- 
duction to " Suydam, Jackson & Co.," and " John Steward & Co.," dry 
goods houses in Pearl-street, and to "Smith, Mills & Co.," grocers in 
Front-street. His letters from Doxtater and Burch were to " Davison 
& Van Pelt," and to " Tilden & Roberts," dealers in dry goods. 

Thus equipped, on the 15th of April, 1830, with a small valise in hand 
containing a few articles of linen, he set out for the city of New-York ; 
resolved that, in the event of the New-Yorkers refusing him credit, he 
would lay out the $270 to the best advantage, and commence trade 
with this small stock rather than relinquish his purpose and again accept 
a clerkship. On arriving in the city, he called around on the several 



HIRAM J. MINER, OF NEW- YORK. 533 

merchants to whom he had letters of introduction. After making the 
usual inquiries as to the amount of his capital, means of payment, Aic, 
and being frankly told that his capital was scarcely $300, and that he 
relied solely on his cash sales to meet the payment on any goods they 
should see fit to credit him with, most of them showed evident signs ot 
interest in his behalf, mingled with surprise at the boldness of his under- 
taking; for, although he was then 26 years of age, his appearance indicated 
a youth of 20. He was told by all except one house, viz. : that of Da- 
vison & Van Pelt, that, although they must decline to credit him with 
a, full bill of goods, they were willing to sell him, on six months' credit, 
to the amount of tioo to three hundred dollars each. Messrs. Smith & 
Mills offered to credit him, at four months, with one-half of the bill he 
might wish to buy of them. When these matters were adjusted, he 
returned to his room at the hotel, and after figuring up, he found that 
at all the places together he could obtain a credit of about $1,000. 
This, with the $270 cash capital, would enable him, by a careful 
selection, to secure a little of the usual assortment kept in country 
stores. Before leaving home, he had prepared a memorandum of what 
he wished to purchase, provided he should get the desired credit, noting 
the probable cost of each article and extending the same. When footed 
up, it amounted to about $2,200. But he now saw that to keep with- 
in his limits, and at the same time preserve his assortment, be must 
buy just one-half the quantity of each article indicated on the memo- 
randum. With this purpose he went to work. After looking over the 
the market two days, examining styles, prices, &;c., and contracting for 
the price of shipment and freight of goods, he commenced going over 
the stocks at the three dry -goods houses where he was to make his se- 
lections, viz. : Jagger & Rathbone, Suydam, Jackson & Co., and Tilden 
& Roberts. But here another difficulty met him. In order that he 
might get the assortment in so small a quantity as to keep within the 
limits of his credit, goods would have to be cut and divided, which is 
not always readily done, nor usually expected to be done, in selling 
goods at wholesale. Therefore, before he ventured to select and " lay 
under" an article, he went to the house of Jagger & Rathbone, and said 
to Charles Underbill that he would commence the purchase with him, 
provided he would divide or cut each and every article so far as neces- 
sary to make up the assortment which he desired the bill to comprise. 
Mr. Underbill promptly and characteristically replied, " Yes, sir ; and I 
will even divide a row of pins with you, if you wish, to make the 
assortment complete." At once Mr. Miner commenced the purchase 
of him ; and the first article of goods bought and " laid under," or " in 
the pigeon-hole," for the young merchant, was, 

" h doz. white cotton hose at $4 75 per doz." 

He went on selecting, cutting and dividing, until the bill amounted to 
$353 75. The goods were then packed in a box, and marked " Cam- 
den.^^ He also made a bill with Suydam, Jackson & Co. of $284 35, 
and one with Tilden & Roberts of $54. His grocery bill with Smith, 
Mills & Co. was $397 87, on which he paid $100, and was credited 
the balance for four months. 



534 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

On receiving his bills at the several houses he gave his notes * except 
in the case of Jagger and Rathbone, who told him, on handing his bill, 
that it was charged to his account on book, Mr. Underbill, observing 
his excited expression of countenance caused by this mark of confidence, 
placed his hand on Mr. Miner's shoulder and said, "Young man, I will 
guarantee your success. We will trust you all you will buy of us ; and 
if at any time you need, order us, and we will promptly forward to you." 
This token of confidence attached Mr. Miner to that house, and he con- 
tinued to make there his largest bills as long as they continued in trade. 
Its effect on him at the time was to strengthen the principle which he 
had previously adopted, viz. : to be firm and resolute in purpose and 
faithful to promise, relying on the application of industry and skill for 
success. 

His goods were shipped with much care, he following the carman to 
the boat and attending personally to their delivery. When he had 
seen them all safely on board, he settled his bill at the hotel and has- 
tened away to Camden, the theatre of his future action, and where cen- 
tred his earthly hopes. He was not without anxiety about the result. 
One thing appeared to him certain — that he should either rise above or 
sink far below the common standard of business men. But the grand 
resolve never for a moment forsook him, that if he should fall, he would 
fall, as he expressed it, "in a forward march, with the armor of integ- 
rity on," With these thoughts crowding his mind he entered Camden, 
Tuesday, the 4th of May. 

After perfecting the arrangement with Dea. Upson and invoicing the 
few goods he had on hand, Mr. Miner next proceeded to prepare the 
store for the reception of his new goods, which he daily expected. His 
purchases in New-York had amounted to about $1300, and his debts to 
about $1100. He now commenced his cash account on the credit side 
with $15.75 — money which he brought back from the city, and which 
he immediately sent to New-London, on the canal, to pay on the freight 
bills. His goods arrived in Camden on Wednesday, the 5th, and on 
Thursday morning, May 0, 1830, his store was opened for trade. 

The first article he sold was a copy of the New Testament at twenty- 



* These were the first notes to which Mr. Miner had ever affixed his name. As 
he sitrned the note to Tilden and Roberts, he said to J. B. Hyde, then clerk in this 
nouse — now of the firm of Hill and Hyde, New-York — that he did not design to give 
many such notes, but hoped soon to be able to paij dmcn for his goods. Mr. Hyde 
replied, " Young man, if you make money, ymi, will never see the day when you are 
>ut of debt so long as you are a merchant.'" Mr. Miner did not at the time intend 
-hat this remark should prove true, nor did he entirely comprehend its philosophical 
accuracy. But it did prove exactly true, and his own experience taught him the 
sagacity of Mr. Hyde's remark. During his whole mercantile career he was never 
for a day out of debt, because his financial prosperity continually demanded such 
•ncumbrance . 

Mr. Miner had no more dealing with that house, or further acquaintance or com- 
nunication with Mr. Hyde. But some ticenty-two years afterwards, in a note ap- 
pended to a business letter addressed to him as a banker, Mr. Hyde writes : 

" J. B. Hyde's respects to H. J. Miner, and asks whether that young merchant 
ever got out of debt." 

Mr. Miner replied, " Never while a merchant, and the remark of Mr. Hyde was 
always remembered, and operated as a stimulus in business." 



i 



HIRAM J. MINER, OF NEW-YORK. 535 

five cents, which he called a good beginning. The first day his sales 
amounted to about $12. The first month they were $355,7o, and the 
first year $4,140. Thus his average daily sales for the first year were 
only $13 23. At first he had no clerk, boarded in the family of Dea. 
Upson and slept under the counter. His store was the front end of a 
tin-shop, about 18 by 22 feet — the deacon, meantime, occupying the 
rear for his business. But the location was a central one, just suited 
to his wants. He held his goods for cash down and offered, them at 
Utica prices. It was hard commencing. The country around was new 
and poor, and to sell for cash, and no trust, was an innovation upon all 
former practice in that region. There were three other mercantile 
firms in the place — A. Trobridge & Co., A. Hinkley & Co. and Caverly 
and Sheldon — all crediting and barter establishments. Men daily said 
to him, " I will trade with you if you will trust." And as often they 
assured him, "You can't sell at cash in this place. The people have 
nothing but lumber or produce to pay for goods." But he held on for 
cash only under all discouragements. To credit his goods and run the 
risk of meeting his notes in New-York was out of the question. He 
resolved to have either the money or the goods when his notes should 
become due. He kept a daily account of his profits, and ascertained 
that he gained from $2 to 82.50 per day, which, he thought, all things 
considered, was not very bad. 

The old merchants of Camden at this time had the reputation of 
selling goods " dear," and the people who had means to go and make a 
cash bill, would go to Rome or to Utica for their supplies, and it re- 
quired much patience and long and labored effort to turn the tide of 
trade. Yet, with untiring industry, with energy unflinching, he put 
forth his efforts to sell for cash ; but to one less persevering and hopeful, 
it would have been a disheartening work. Frequently his sales fell to 
one, two, or five dollars per day. As often as he got out of an article 
a supply was immediately ordered, and soon he began to add to his 
little assortment articles not kept at the other stores. Almost every 
thing wanted by the people could be had of him, although kept in so 
small quantities that one good customer would sometimes break his 
assortment; but then it was immediately replenished by a fresh order. 
There was no bank where he could deposit his money nearer than 
Utica — thirty-two miles, and the receipts for his first five months' sales 
he carried in his pocket by day, and at night placed under his pillow 
in the stocking. 

Most of the bread used at that time by the inhabitants of Camden 
was of the coarser kind — rye and Indian corn. Mr. Miner, after a 
little time, brought in wheat Jlour, and offered at retail by the pound or 
barrel. Salt he had previously introduced soon after commencing 
trade. He was the first merchant, and probably the first man, to offer 
flour by the barrel in that town. His first purchase in this article was 
a lot of three barrels, superfine, from Utica, the cost of which, at his 
store, was S6 per barrel, and which he sold at $6 25. The first cus- 
tomer who ventured on so large a supply as to take a whole barrel 
was Reuben Bettis. His first barrel of salt was sold to a Mr. Flanagan, 
of Amboy. 

Occasionally, during the first few months, when the curtain of night 



636 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

was dropped, as he lay alone in his little bunk under the counter, a 
feeling of sadness and discouragement would come over his spirit. The 
prospect of success looked gloomy, his sales averaging only about $10 
per day. The probability of being able to meet his notes seemed 
dubious. Thoughts of failure at the end of six months — of goods 
seized and sold — of being " a broken merchant,'" with notes dishonored 
and reputation lost — would haunt his hours of rest, and darken his 
visions of the brilliant future. But on the return of morning light, he 
would rise with renewed courage, and new determination, and fresh 
hope. 

Let it be borne in mind that, in all his previous mercantile exer- 
tions while a clerk, he had had no training in the arts of managing such 
business with limited means, for his employers were men of capital ; nor 
had any care or responsibility rested on him other than simply what 
belonged to his position as a clerk ; and that now his situation was 
directly the reverse — he had no means ; no capital in trade, or next to 
none; was in a new country, among strangers, and without influence; 
alone, having no clerk, because his small business would not warrant 
the expense ; maintaining an attitude opposed to all former practice of 
merchants in that region, in rejecting the credit system; subject to the 
taunts and jeers of the trade pointed against a '■'■cash store," with such 
an insignificant stock of goods, cooped up in one end of a tin-shop, in a 
room eighteen by twenty-two feet ; let all these things be borne in 
mind, and his slow progress at the first is certainly not to be wondered 
at. The marvel rather is, that he did not yield to these adverse cir- 
cumstances, and give up altogether. That he did not can only be 
ascribed to his inflexible decision, to that characteristic firmness of pur- 
pose which nothing less than the extinguishment of life itself seemed 
capable of breaking up. 

Perhaps in this connection it ought to be said, that his purposes, so 
fixed, were never rashly taken. He was cautious of unconsidered acts, 
carefully estimating and balancing probable results, and especially 
sensitive to the danger of dishonor from unpaid debts. As an example 
of his cautiousness and decision, let the following incident be given : 
Sometime in August of this year, he was expecting a visit from his 
brothers, John and Isaac, from Westmoreland, and had sent to John an 
order for a small bill of cotton goods and groceries, with a request 
that he would purchase the same in Utica, and bring them up with him. 
The order specified the exact amount of each article wanted. John went 
to Utica to make the purchase, but, finding cotton goods cheaper than he 
expected, ventured to take some four or five pieces of sheeting more 
than was ordered, and, instead of the prescribed " half bale of batting," 
he took a whole bale. 

The brothers went to Camden with a one-horse wagon, through the 
deep sand, in the heat of summer, to make Hiram a visit, taking with 
them the goods to replenish his stock. The load of goods and tho 
sand of the road made it necessary for, at least, one of them to walk a 
large part of the way. It was an all-day's work for them to get there. 
Mr. Miner was glad to see his brothers. They were the first of his 
friends who had ventured to visit him since he became a merchant. 
But on examining the goods, and finding that John had transcended his 



HIRAM J. MINER, OF NKW-TORK. 53 Y 

order, he was not a little displeased, and said to his brother, that he 
must return the half bale of batting and the excess of sheeting, in all 
amounting to about $20. " Very well," says John, *' I can do it. 
But it seems a pity, after dragging them through the sand, besides foot- 
ing it most of the way, that now a part of them should iiave to be re- 
turned," Such considerations, however, were unavailing. The laconic 
reply was, " You should have gone by my order, and all would have 
been right." And so, after remaining a day or two, John, on his re- 
turn, took with him the excess of goods, and restored them to the 
merchant in Utica. It seemed that, from the first, he had some appre- 
hension of the result, for at the time of taking them, he had engajjed 
for the privilege of reluming the excess, in case they were refused. 
With Mr. Miner this has ever been a marked characteristic from 
early life, exacting strict and literal obedience to rightful authority. 
When a rule of conduct or plan of action is once marked out, he will 
suffer no deviation from it. The motto which, in all his business, he 
has ever impressed on his clerks, is, " Obey orders, if you break 
owners.'''' And to this rigid exactitude he ascribes much of his success. 
Camden is situated eighteen miles northwest from Rome, and 
thirteen miles from New-London, the nearest point on the canal. 
Merchandise, therefore, had to be transported in wagons for a con- 
siderable distance, and over a road of deep sand. It was a hard day's 
work for a team to go to the canal and return with a load the same 
day. Hence heavy goods, when sold at Utica prices, afforded little or 
no profit. He shortly learned that he must make the increased profits 
on light articles compensate for the want of profit on the heavier and 
more common goods, keeping the latter especially low. 

Adopting this system in trade, which, though common now, had not 
then been much if any introduced, he saw at length that he began to 
make an impression among the people; and after a few months his trade 
began materially to increase. With the increase of trade his courage 
and confidence, of course, increased. It was not, therefore, strange that 
then other thoughts should crowd upon him, and tiiat, on another topic, 
hope long deferred should present her claim. He was a man, with 
the sentiments and affections of humanity, and he thought that if, to 
help smooth the rough sea of life, and make his career a more agree- 
able, if not a more prosperous one, he should establish a ./?V?«, by 
taking in a perpetual partner of the gentler sex, it certainly would be no 
crime, and might be attended with many conveniences and delicate 
comforts, and he resolved to marry. 

Forthwith he proceeded to make the needful arrangements for house- 
keeping, renting a small house of his friend, Dea. Upson. Then, having 
procured the attendance of his brother John in the store during his ab- 
sence, he set off to New-York for his fiill supply of goods, taking Vernon 
Centre in his way. Here, in his visit to Miss Adaline, the prelimina- 
ries of the wedding were settled, and he passed on to the city. He had 
been able to realize, from the sale of goods, about $1,213, which after 
the necessary appropriations for other purposes, gave him nearly enough 
to meet his notes, although they were not yet due. Arriving in New- 
York, he first took up all his notes, paying as far as his money went, 
and for the small balances giving short bank-notes. He found all his 



588 SKETCHES OF EMFNTENT AMERICANS, 

creditors quite willing to sell him goods on six months' time, and from 
that day forward he found no difficulty in obtaining all the goods he chose 
to buy on credit. At this time he ventured'to purchase to the amount 
of a little over $2,000. His selections were made with great care, and 
the goods shipped under his own eye. Having completed his business 
in the city, he returned to Vernon Centre, where, at eight o'clock on the 
morning after his arrival, October 19, 1830, he was married, by Rev. 
Mr. Garrison, to Miss Adaline M. Hungerford^ second daughter ot 
widow Celinda Hungerford, then and for many years a resident of that 
place. 

Mrs. Miner's father was Lot Hungerford, a descendant of a Puritan 
family of that name who emigrated from England in the seventeenth 
century, and located in East Haddam, Connecticut, and from whom 
sprang most of the Hungerfords in this country. He died in Vernon 
Centre, January 8, 1827.* 

Immediately after their marriage they set off for Camden, in a one- 
horse wagon, going by the way of Westmoreland, and calling a short 
time on Mr. Miner's parents. They had intended to go through the 
same day, but the evening was stormy and dark, and they were com- 
pelled to pause for the night at a tavern some miles short. Next morn- 
ing they arrived in Camden. After taking board some two weeks in 
the family of Mr. Humphrey Brown, they commenced housekeeping 
''in their own hired house."f 

Mrs. Miner was well fitted for her new station, and to be the compa- 
nion of such a man. She had been brought up as a farmer's daughter, 
and was skilled in all her household duties. She was retiring and do- 
mestic in her habits, content in her appropriate sphere, and never con- 
cerning herself with her husband's business, but relying with entire con- 
fidence on his prudence and sagacity. Her disposition in this respect 
was especially suited to Mr. Miner, who always acted with independ- 
ence and decision, and would never endure interference from any 
quarter in his business transactions. 

After the new goods arrived, and had been properly marked and ar- 
ranged for sale, John returned to Westmoreland, and Isaac, then twenty- 
two years old, came to Camden and entered his brother's store as clerk, 
October 20, 1830. His salary was at first only $50 a year, but was 
gradually increased through a period oi seven years, at the end of which 
he was taken in as a partner.^ Isaac had previously been accustomed 
from early youth to hard labor, working in the summer with his father 
at the trade of carpenter and joiner, and often, during the winter, chopping 



* Sextus H. HuiifrerforJ. Esq., the present banker of WestfielJ. Chautauque 
county. New-York, is a son of Lot Huncjerford, and brother of Mrs. Miner. 

+ Their marriage has been subsequently blessed with five children, two sons and 
three daughters ; but death has been among them, and only the eldest daughter, 
now a young woman, remains, together with a little son, adopted in 1844, while 
an infant, on whom Mr. Miner has bestowed his own name, and who, he intends, if 
spared, shall share his property. 

X The partnership continued something more than three years, when it was dis- 
solved, and Hiram again went on in the business separately as before. But Isaac 
has since, in his own operations, secured a high and honorable reputation as a 
merchant. 



HIRAM J. MINER, OF NEW-YORK. 539 

firewood at twenty-five cents a cord. But althoiligh he had been totally 
unused to business, except laboring at the bench or in the field, he soon 
made himself decidedly useful as a clerk. He was active, quick, and 
always on hand. His whole attention was directed to selling goods; 
and in a few years his older and more experienced brother was obliged 
to yield the palm to him in sales at the counter. Mr. Miner says of 
him, " 1 confidently believe his equal as a salesman, while in his prime, 
could scarcely be met with in country or city, and 1 feel that I owe 
much of my prosperity to the efbcient aid 1 received at his hand." He 
would never practise deception to effect a sale, but accomplished his 
end by tact and skill. He read at a glance the disposition of a cus- 
tomer, and then, by adopting his conversation to please, and by the offer 
of cheap articles, he managed to win confidence. That point gained, 
he had little else to do but to cut off' and put up the goods wanted, 
make out the bill, and receive the cash. He also had the faculty to 
hold his customers. He made himself a favorite with them, so that if 
they traded with him once, they would be quite sure to come again. 

After the first year the business of the store rapidly increased. 
Customers began to come from a greater distance, and the reputation 
of Mr. Miner tor selling goods "cheap" became widely extended, so 
that his cash sales for the second year amounted to upwards of $10,000. 
Thus he continued to augment his trade year by year, until it reached 
a large amount — probably as large as that of any other similar establish- 
ment out of the city. 

In the autumn of 1832 his business had become so much enlarged 
that he could no longer be confined in the little room in which he com- 
menced, but needed the whole building. The deacon not caring to rent 
all his shop, Mr. Miner purchased the entire premises, together with a 
small dwelling-house adjoining, for §1,000. At once he removed his 
family into the dwelling-house, and proceeded to lengthen his sales- 
room some twenty feet, and occupied the rear for a store-house. But 
after about two years more, his business demanded a still larger space 
for the exhibition and sale of goods ; and accordingly another lengthen- 
ing of the room was made, by extending it through the whole building, 
some sixty feet ; while a store-house was erected in the rear. He had 
now a very fair space for his trading operations. 

Sometime in the second year of his business, Mr. Miner had begun 
to receive most kinds of produce in exchange for goods, but still hold- 
ing on to the ready-pay principle. For nearly five years, his charged 
accounts were very insignificant. Now and then he would give credit 
to a farmer of undoubted responsibility, but always at cash prices. 
Proceeding in this manner, his trade continued steadily to increase for 
about ten years. He skilfully adapted his business to the wants of the 
community, keeping almost every article required by the people, and 
receiving all kinds of produce. Whatever a farmer wanted, or what- 
ever product he had to sell, either for cash or in exchange for goods, 
here was the merchant. 

In the spring of 1836, he lost his two little sons— both in the space 
of about one week. This was a severe blow, and felt to be such. " I 
regarded it," says Mr. Miner, " as a deserved chastisement^ of Divine 
Providence. I had been wholly absorbed in the pursuit of business •, 



640 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

but here was a stop — a rest. I now saw how uncertain is our hold on 
earth. Property, business, all — all receded for a time. 1 paused and 
reflected. But soon business called. Engagements were to be fulfill- 
ed. I reluctantly resumed my position in the store, and was shortly 
after crowding my work with usual zeal." 

About this time, or very soon after, Mr. Miner received into his store 
as clerk his youngest brother, Heman, then sixteen years of age. He 
was of a different turn altogether from Isaac, being of few words, and 
not so much a favorite with customers. He was, however, a fair sales- 
man ; correct and honorable in all his deal — ever acting openly, and 
despising meanness ; and withal, possessed of a marked talent for dis- 
patch. He has since succeeded well in business ; and, both as a mer- 
chant and a citizen, occupies a very respectable position. 

In the spring of 1837, he extended his business by starting a store in 
Westfield, Chautauque county, New-York, in connection with his 
brother-in-law, S. H. Hungerford. Mr. Hungerford had always been a 
farmer, and had accumulated a small property in Vernon, by agricul 
ture ; but was now determined to seek his fortune in the West. He 
traveled as far as Westfield, where he stopped for a few days ; and, 
being in conversation with Mr. Babcock, then a merchant of Westfield, 
the latter oftered to sell his goods, and rent his store for a term of five 
years. Mr. Hungerford at once made a conditional agreement to take 
the goods and the premises, if he should wish to do so after seeing his 
brother-in-law, Mr. Miner, whom he thought might probably be induced 
to engage in the enterprise with him. Thereupon he left Westfield, and 
on horseback, over muddy roads, in the month of March, hastened back 
to Vernon, and thence to Camden, where he arrived late in the evening. 
After a brief conversation, suited to the occasion, he revealed his errand 
to Camden. Mr. Miner had only known him as a farmer ; but, in that 
character, as a man of clear, sound judgment, and nicely discriminating 
perceptions. After hearing his representation, and receiving his pro- 
position — each to furnish $3,000 capital, Mr. Miner promptly said to 
him : " Do you return to Westfield, invoice the goods, make out the 
memorandum for new goods, and forward it to me at New- York, where 
I shall be about the 10th of April ; and if it reaches me before I leave for 
nome, I will purchase and send on the stock." Early the next morning 
Mr. Hungerford was off; proceeding in the same manner — on horse- 
back, through mud and storms, to Westfield again. Mr. Miner heard 
no more of him until he had purchased his goods for Camden, and was 
about to leave the city for home, when he received through the mail a 
communication from Mr. Hungerford, containing his memorandum. At 
once he bought the goods, amounting to about $5,000, of which he had 
$3,000 charged to himself, and forwarded them to Westfield. 

Thus commenced, they continued in business together until the end 
of the five years, when Mr. Miner bought Mr. Hungerford's interest in 
the establishment, and has since continued it in connection with the for- 
mer clerk, Mr. Thomas Knight. Mr. Hungerford subsequently com- 
menced the Bank of Westfield, of which he is now the sole proprietor, and 
is doing a successful banking business. Mr. Miner says : " I visited 
Westfield only once during the five years in which I was in business 
with Hr. Hungerford. I knew what he must be as a merchant and 



HIRAM J. MINER OF NEW-YORK. 541 

financier, from my acquaintance with him as a farmer only ; nor had I 
any anxiety as to the result. His success in mercantile puisuits, and 
his later operations in banking, indicate whether or not 1 judged him 
correctly. Whatever impetus he may have gathered by his cunnection 
with me, he is emphatically a self-made man." 

It will be remembered that the time when the Westfield enterprise 
commenced, (1837), was one of great commercial embarrassment all 
over the country. The banks had stopped specie payments, and mer- 
chants as well as all other business men every where severely crippled. 
But Mr. Miner moved right on, as if all were easy. He even bought 
and sold larger quantities of goods than usual. From 1837 to 1839, 
his stock in the Camden store would invoice from twenty-five to thirty 
thousand dollars ; and his notes were all promptly met. 

In 1839, finding his business continually increasing, he determined to 
build a store suited to the wants of his accumulating trade. The size 
decided upon was 22 by 90 feet on the ground, and three stories high, 
except 20 feet of the rear, which was to be two stories high. Having 
completed his design, the little dwelling-house was removed, and the 
new store erected on its site. The whole was so constructed as conve- 
niently to meet the wants of business, and at the same time preserve 
neatness and taste in the arrangements. Its cost was about $4,000 ; 
and for commodiousness, elegance, and substantial work, there are few 
if any wood buildings of the kind in country towns which surpass it even 
at the present time. It was commenced in April, 1829, and completed 
and filled with goods in September following — five months. 

Being now in possession of a store of sufficient size, Mr. Miner was 
able to enlarge his assortment so as to meet the demands of trade. He 
entered more extensively into the purchase of produce, such as grain, 
pork, and the various kinds of lumber. He was also more liberal in 
extending credit to such as desired it. But stUl he held out the cash and 
ready-pay principle as the basis of his trade ; and his credit busiu ess 
was comparatively small. Although, at this time and afterwards, he 
had the farmers in debt to him to an amount ranging generally from 
ten to twenty thousand dollars, this was never relied upon in his calcu- 
lations to meet a debt for goods in New- York or elsewhere. For such 
purposes he relied upon cash sales solely. He scarcely ever dunned a 
good customer on going to the city. While he was himself never sued, 
in not more than two or three instances did he serve a legal process, 
and never sold property to collect a debt. And although he continued 
his trade in that town about twenty years, one thousand dollars would 
cover the entire losses of his mercantile business in Camden. In his pur- 
chase and transportation of goods from New-York he was equally suc- 
cessful, because equally careful. He never met with accidents, as 
others do, growing out of ill-advised proceedings, or from trusting 
to others what should be done by himself; and therefore had no claims 
to be adjusted with transportation companies in courts of justice. The 
same watchfulness, and close personal attention to his business with 
which he began, he continued to maintain, acting ever the maxim of 
Doctor Franklin, which in early life he adopted as his own, viz. : " It 
you want a thing done, do it yourself; if not, send some one.'' 

During his first ten years in Camden, Mr. Miner enjoyed almost un- 



542 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

interrupted good health, and was able to endure much fatigue. When 
occasion seemed to require it, he would be out at mid-day or midnight, 
regardless of weather. If attending to engagements, nothing could de- 
ter hina : — they must be fulfilled at any hazard. When abroad, if other 
conveyance could not readily be had, he would take to his feet rather 
than be detained an hour after his business was accomplished. The 
following flict will illustrate his manner of attending to business, and 
driving it forward in the face of difficulties • " It was usual for him to 
delay the purchase of flour and salt until the last of boating, late in the 
fall. On one occasion it was delayed until the latter part of Novem- 
ber. The ice began to make in the canal; and there was danger that 
if a boat-load were ordered from Syracuse, whence he was accustomed 
to procure it, it would get froze in before reaching New-London. To 
prevent such a result, and get it through if possible, he determined to 
superintend the matter in person. Accordingly he repaired to New- 
London, hired a boat and crew of J. I. Carley, and proceeded to Syra- 
cuse — about forty-five miles. The weather was freezing cold, and ice 
was rapidly accumulating in the canal ; but he loaded his boat with flour 
and salt, and commenced the return trip. The old man, who filled the 
double office of captain and helmsman of the boat, indulged rather free- 
ly in his cups, ' to keep off the cold ;' and was thus, in a great measure 
disqualified for his business. At nearly every bend of the canal he 
would ' bank the boat,' at the imminent risk of sinking the load. After 
remonstrating with him to no purpose, Mr. Miner at length, taking ad- 
vantage of a favorable position of the captain, seized and shoved him 
into the stern cabin, and fastened him in. Then taking the helm him- 
self, he ordered the driver to go on ; while, with no previous experi- 
ence, he steered the boat safely through ice and snow, and around 
bends, from near Syracuse to New-London. On his arrival, Mr. Carley 
remarked that he was very sorry to see him in that position — helmsman 
for his boat. Mr. Miner assured him that, to prevent sinking the load 
he had headed a mutiny, and put the captain in the hold; and that now 
he would resign his usurped authority into Mr. Carley's hands." Afi;er 
seeing the boat safely moored at the dock. Mr. Miner returned to Cam- 
den ; and in a few days the canal closed for the season. 

In February, 1841, he was appointed postmaster for Camden, and 
resigned the office in February, 1847. This was the only official public 
trust ever conferred on him. Confining himself closely to his privatf 
business, he has never sought office of any kind, nor desired the burden 
and perplexity attending it. 

The same year with his receiving the appointment of postmaster he 
increased the number of his derks by the addition of his brother John; 
who, a little before had sold out his own goods at Lairdsville, and 
moved his family into Camden. Mr. Miner had now a pretty strong 
corps for a country merchant, consisting of his three brothers, and two 
others, besides himself — six in all. Nor did his business admit of any 
idleness among them. On the contrary, they were crowded continually. 
Soon after this Mr. Miner had another narrow escape from instant 
death by a fall. He was in the habit of taking home at night, in 
nis hand, a heavy tin trunk, containing books, papers, &c., and going 
out at the back door. Nearly under this door, on the outside, was » 



HIRAM J. MINER, OF NEW- YORK. ' 543 

hatchway leading to the cellar. On one occasion, some person had care- 
lessly left the hatch-door open ; and as Mr. Miner was going out with 
trunk in hand, the evening being dark, one of the clerks held a light be 
fore him, the glare of which so blinded his eyes that he did not see the 
open hatchway ; and stepping from the door-sill he was instantly pre- 
cipitated to the bottom — a distance of ten feet. He held fast the trunk, 
the weight of which brought him down head foremost, and he struck 
upon his shoulders. In his descent he just grazed the stone wall, which 
tore the coat from his back. A slight variation might have dashed his 
head against the wall. As it was, he was severely stunned, and did not 
fully recover from its effects for nearly a year. 

In the fall of 1844, Mr. Miner, in company with his brothers, John 
and Isaac, made a visit to Sheldon and Attica for the first time since 
their father's removal from Genesee county. It was, of course, an 
occasion of peculiar interest to them. On reaching the home of theii 
childhood in Sheldon, they were deeply impressed with what they saw. 
But twenty-seven years had passed, yet how wonderful the changes. 
both real and apparent ! Instead of forests and half-cleared lands, clean 
and well-fenced farms with broad fields of grain appeared. The great 
hills seemed to have fallen from half their height. The deep gulf was 
now only a small ravine. The stream in which was once their swimming 
holes and fishing places had dwindled to a small rill. That little wil- 
low, planted next the fence in front of the log-cabin by the hand of 
their dear departed mother, was grown to be a large tree. In the shade 
of its wide-spreading branches Hiram stood, and gazed, and thought. 
He walked a few steps aside, then turned and gazed again upon the 
^villow. He remembered the hand that planted it. He thought of that 
mother's cares, her sad trials, and the many affecting scenes enacted 
upon this very spot. The log-cabin was no more; but before his 
quickened imagination it rose, and stood in its rustic simplicity. He 
could see its rude door — the latch — the string — the wooden pin hanging 
on the inside to fasten the door with at night — the open gable end — his 
mother just coming around the corner of the house with hdr pail of 
water dipped up from the little brook in the rear — the tea-kettle hang- 
ing on the trammel suspended from a horizontal pole above the fire — 
the humble meal in preparation — and the children in all their glee. 
Another look was cast upon the willow. Its very leaves seemed 
sacred, it brought so freshly to mind his mother — all her features, 
her looks, and her oft-repeated counsel and encouragement, '"Do right, 
and all will be well." He raised his hand and plucked carefully a small 
branch, and walked sadly away. Then they looked on the grave of 
their sister. A stone marked the spot where she was laid. They thought 
and talked of how young she was when taken from them, and how old 
she now had been, if living. The elder brother, especially, felt re- 
proached by the reflection that twenty-eight years had rolled by since 
the remains of that little sister had rested in this lone spot ; and yet, 
after the first year when the family removed, he had not visited it. 
Then, with sad emotions and serious thoughts, they bid adieu to 
the hallowed place. 

After going over the neighborhood and introducing themselves to 
some old acquaintances, who had known them among the pioneers of 



544 ' SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

the town as poor, destitute, half-starved lads, and talking over with them 
the scenes of by -gone days, they directed their course to Attica. Here 
they spent a day or two in visiting the spots and wandering over 
the grounds of their youthful sports and toils. From the interesting 
reminiscences thus awakened they at last turned thoughtfully away, to 
renew asain the conflicts of life. 

Mr. Miner's mercantile career in Camden seemed, in 1844, to have 
reached the maximum of enterprise and prosperity which the location 
admitted of lie had begun in 1830 at the very lowest point, and risen 
rapidly until he had reached the present elevation ; but from this stand 
he was unable to make any perceptible progress. But he was now a 
merchant of the highest character. The strictest order and regularity 
was maintained through all his operations. Each clerk knew exactly 
his place and his duties. His customers were always furnished with a bill 
of the goods purchased, which had been previously examined and called 
back by a second clerk. By a careful attention to the convenience and 
interest of his customers he knew he promoted his own. All alike 
were noticed who entered his store, whether the poor with their pennies, 
or the rich with their dollars. Children sent to his store by their 
parents or guardians were attended to with special promptness and care. 
Regard was had, not merely to what could be made on one bill sold to 
a person, but to what might be made in the long run, by such treat- 
ment as should secure him for a permanent customer. In this way, from 
the smallest beginnings he had gathered a large trade. He had erected 
a store* after his own ideas of convenience, neatness, elegance, and 
space. He had connected with it every available branch of trade belong- 
ing to, or which could be advantageously managed in, a mercantile 
establishment. He had combined in his assortment almost every 
variety of dry goods, groceries, hardware, and drugs. He had divised a 
new plan for keeping accounts without books. He had, in a great 
measure, overturned the old method of doing business, and introduced 
another to the saving of much time and treasure. He had repudiated, 
for the most part, the credit system, and established the principle of 
selling goods for ready cash. He had broken in upon high prices, and 
demonstrated that more money could be made by selling at small pro- 
fits than high. He had made Camden, in no small degree, the mart for 
its own productions, and given it a wide reputation as the place where 
goods were to be bought "cheap." 

In his own store he had laid it down as a jyrinciplc, to sell goods at 
least a Utile cheaper than any other merchant in the place. And when- 
ever a neighboring merchant ventured to challenge this principle by a 
practical test, the demonstration was given without any flinching. At 
one time the trial was made on a paper of tobacco, worth one shilling. 
The run was commenced by a merchant across the street, who oflered 
It to a customer for a penny less. The man reported the offer at Mi- 



* Besides this, he erected numerous other buildings in Camden, which contribu- 
ted much to improve the place. 



HIRAM J. MINER, OT NEW- YORK. 545 

ner's store,, when instantly it was put a penny below the opposite ofler. 
Back the customer went, and was offered it a penny lower still ; then 
returned to Miner's, where another penny was underbid. Thus the 
sport went on — the countryman trotting back and forth across the 
street until he grew tired, when he took his stand in the middle of 
the road, while a clerk stood in each door echoing his principal within. 
The strife went on, each side alternately offering a penny below the 
jther, until the was reached, when the reverse order commenced, at a 
penny a time, to pay the maJifor taking it. Higher and higher the bids 
rose, first on one side, then on the other — the countryman standing in 
ecstasy between — :until at length Miner bid a shilling, when the other 
merchant, beginning to fear the result, held up, and the man took his 
tobacco of Miner, with a shilling to boot. Insignificant as this incident 
was in itself, it was widely reported, and had an essential influence in 
establishing the impression that Miner would sell goods cheaper than any 
other mafi. At another time, a run was made on a barrel of salt, the 

regular price of which was $2. Mr. IT W , one of Mr. Miner's 

customers, came for a barrel, and was told sixpence less by a merchant 
over the way. Miner replied, " We will sell for sixpence less than you 
can buy it elsewhere." " Well," said the customer, " 1 will buy where 
I can get it the cheapest," and he drove his team back and forth, from 
one store to the other, each falling sixpence below the other every time, 
until it was run down to a mere trifle, when the other merchant yielded, 
and Miner sold the salt. A few incidents of this kind fixed Mr. Miner 
in the public mind as the merchant who would not he undersold. 
Whatever the price of an article might be elsewhere, the general con- 
viction was, " At Miner's it is cheaper." 

He had now accumulated a large capital, and acquired an influence 
which was strongly felt in all that region, and especially throughout the 
range of his extensive trade. His yearly profits were satisfactory — he 
could make money enough out of the business he was now doing. But 
that did not prevent the feeling of uneasiness which he began to realize 
because he could see no further progress., or prospect of extension or 
improvement of his business in the little town of Camden. He wanted 
more room — larger business-space to operate in ; and he began to 
think of the city. Camden was then an isolated town, shut away 
from the great thoroughfares of business and travel, and approached 
only by heavy sand roads. With these thought sand feelings, he was 
meditating a change, when, in 1845-G, the project of the " Rome and 
Watertown Rail-road" began to be gravely agitated. This was a capi- 
tal idea for Mr. Miner. He wanted some new project for improvement 
— something that would promise enlargement of business. Hence 
the projected rail-road through Camden awakened new hopes, inspired 
fresh zeal, and his ambition was enlisted to help it forward. He be- 
lieved it would open new avenues of trade ; develop the hitherto hid- 
den resources of that section, and not only open a market for the farm- 
ing productions of the country farther north, but also bring into market 
the vast lumber region in and around Camden. He had also confidence 
that the stock of the road would pay well, and he gave the project his 

35 



546 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

hearty co-operation. Numerous meetings in regard to it were held, 
and not a little enthusiasm was enkindled. Camden had heretofore 
been so excluded from the great improvements of the day, that any- 
thing which promised good, like the present enterprise, was seized on 
with avidity. Mr. Miner at first subscribed to the stock $5,000. At 
a subsequent meeting he increased his subscription to $10,000, on con- 
dition that other citizens of Camden and vicinity should raise the sum 
to $50,000. A committee was appointed to urge on the subscription, 
which went up to $47,500. Mr. Miner then offered to take one quarter 
of the balance, but through the remissness of some, and on account of 
the discouragements occasioned by a stringent money-market, the sub- 
scription was then allowed to linger ; and finally failed altogether, for 
want of the stipulated amount necessary to make it binding. 

The uncertainty which seemed to hang over the prospects of this en- 
terprise in 1846 and '47 contributed to Mr. Miner's restlessness, and in 
June of '47 he removed his family to the city of Utica, as the first step 
towards an ultimate change of business. Another and perhaps no less 
efficient cause of his removal at that time was a desire to educate his 
three daughters, then approaching the age which required all the ad- 
vantages that parental affection could afford to qualify them properly 
for the duties of subsequent life. 

After his removal to Utica, some time in 1848, the Rome and Water- 
town Rail-road was undertaken anew, when Mr. Miner took $3000 of 
the stock, which he still holds. The road was commenced and com- 
pleted in 1849-1851, and is now reckoned among the best paying rail- 
roads in the country. 

While his family were residing in Utica, Mr. Miner still continued 
his business in Camden and prosecuted it with unabated vigor for three 
years. He usually went to the city on Saturday afternoon, and re- 
turned to Camden on Monday morning. Commonly he went from 
Camden to Rome in private conveyance, and thence to Utica by rail- 
road, after arriving in the city at midnight, and again leaving at the 
same hour in the night following. On many a cold winter's night, be- 
tween 1 o'clock and early dawn, did he perform the trip from Rome to 
Camden, wrapped up in his cloak, and perched upon boxes or bales of 
goods, making no stop, however cold or stormy it might be. Nothing 
eould deter him from attending to engagements at the appointed time. 
Neither his family in Utica nor his business in Camden could be ne- 
glected. All were cared for, and none but himself was permitted to 
feel the inconvenience of his situation. But it was a draft upon his 
strong constitution which could not fail of its effect — it sensibly impaired 
his health. 

Early in the autumn of 1847, the "Fort Stanwix Bank" at Rome 
was commenced with a capital of $100,000. Mr. Miner took $5,000 
of its stock, assisted in its organization, and was chosen one of its first 
directors. This was his introduction to the business of banking. Very 
soon after this the subject of a Camden bank began to be agitated. 
Judging from the position and resources of Camden, encompassed by 
poor farming lands and rather light farmers, having few capitalists and 
comparatively little commercial business, Mr. Miner did not think fa- 
vorably of the project and at first gave it no encouragement. But 



64'7 

others viewed the matter differently — were sanguine in the belief that 
Camden was a favorable location for such an institution, and set about 
its establishment by getting subscriptions to its stock. When much 
effort had been expended in raising the subscription, Mr. Miner, from 
the urgent solicitation of its friends, at length took stock in the concern, 
and at its organization in the following winter was unanimously elected 
president. He had, however, from the first, serious doubts about the 
policy of connecting himself with the institution, and especially as one 
of its officers. But moved solely by respect to the feelings of his fel- 
low-townsmen, he accepted the distinguished mark of confidence, and 
entered on the responsible duties of president of the bank. The next 
few months were occupied in perfecting its arrangements, and in May, 
1848, "the Camden Bank" commenced business. 

The beginning of this year was made memorable to Mr. Miner and 
his family, as a period of deep affliction. Death entered again the little 
circle of children and wrested two more from the arms of the agonized 
parents. On his accustomed resort to Camden, Mr. Miner had left his 
family in their usual health. But a hurried messenger came informing 
nim that Gertrude, his second daughter, was sick. He hastened home 
with all speed, and arrived about two o'clock in the night. On enter- 
ing the door he was told that the doctor had given her up as past re- 
covery. The words were arrows in his heart. He approached her bed 
and impressed a kiss upon her lips. " Now," said she, " I am willing to 
die — 1 have seen father again."* She lingered until about two o'clock 
the following day, when with calmness and perfect clearness of mind 
she expired. f 

This stroke of Providence was severely felt by Mr. and Mrs. Miner, 
and yet they had hardly recovered from the first shock before it was 
repeated. In just one month from the death of Gertrude, Adeline, the 
youngest daughter, was attacked with the same disease (ulcerated sore 
throat) and died. On receiving the intelligence of her sickness, by 
messenger, as before, Mr. Miner again hastened home, and the next 
day she expired. J 

* Previous to Mr. Miner's arrival, her mother had asked her if she was willing to 
die, when she replied " Yes, mother, but I would like to see father first," and re- 
quested his likeness to be brought to her. 

t About an hour before her end a neighbor was conversing with her about death, 
when she requested hira to read from the Sunday-school book — " Memoir of Nathan 
W. Dickerman," by Rev. G. D. Abbott. He inquired what part she would have 
him read. She said, " The little verses." After he had read in several places, she 
said, " That is not it ; let me find it." She took the book and pointed out the fol- 
lowing verse to be read : 

" Begone, unbelief! 
My Saviour is near ; 
And for my relief. 
Will surely appear." 

In less than an hour more her spirit had taken its happy flight. Her remains were 
conveyed to Camden and interred beside those of her little brothers. 

t She was emphatically her mother's child, and the last words she uttered were 
to inquire after her mother. When she was past seeing, Mr. Miner said to her, as 
her mother entered the room, " Adeline, mother is come." Raising her little hand 
as if to feel, she replied, " Mother ! is she 1 Where is she 1" She spoke no more. 
Her remains were interred by the side of the other three, in Camden cemetery. 



548 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

The feelings of Mr. and Mrs. Miner on this trying occasion cannot 
De described. Their little domestic circle was dreadfully broken. 
They were prostrate in the dust. This was enough. They saw that 
they had greviously departed from their duty as Christians, and be- 
lieved they saw why they were chastened. They felt deeply hum- 
bled under the hand of God, and were brought to realize in an 
unusual degree how uncertain is the tenure by which life is held, and 
now important it is to be in constant readiness for the last account. 
They justified the Lord in view of the earthliness of their affections, 
and endeavored to secure a sanctified improvement of what he had 
done. Known duties, long neglected, were now resumed, and their 
thoughts were more of death and heaven, as they saw more clearly the 
vanity of a life spent in the pursuit of baubles. Mr. Miner then re- 
solved, in reliance on divine grace, that he would never go back into the 
world again as he had done; and that he would give more and do more 
for the cause of religion than hitherto. During his residence in Cam- 
den he had never removed his church relation from Adams ; but now, 
as soon as circumstances would permit, he procured a certificate from 
the church in Adams, and united with the first^ Presbyterian church in 
Utica. And from that time forward, he affirms to the writer, property 
has had little or no attraction for him other than as the means of ac- 
complishing honorable business purposes and doing good. 

The summer of 1848 Mr. Miner devoted chiefly to his mercantile 
business at Camden, appropriating, however, a portion of his time to 
the affairs of " Camden Bank." He met with the board of directors 
weekly, when the ordinary business was usually disposed of But, in 
presiding over a board of fifteen bank directors, he soon realized the re- 
sponsibility of his position, and thought he had good reason for wishing 
to retire ; yet, for the time, he was induced to remain in his place by 
the apparently urgent solicitations of a large majority of the board and 
other friends of the bank, who assured him of their entire confidence in 
the policy he proposed to pursue in its affairs. 

But during the winter of 1848-9, he became thoroughly convinced oi 
the folly of his continuing longer in the board without a radical change, 
and particularly a change of certain of its officers. Anything aside from 
the perpendicular in matters of business he was unwilling to counte- 
nance ; and where his confidence in character had been once destroyed 
it could not again be restored, nor could anything less than entire dis- 
connection in business with a distrusted person aftbrd him a feeling of 
safety. He felt that both his pecuniary interest and his honor in busi- 
ness demanded one of two things, viz., the change which he sought, and 
which he believed the welfare of the bank required, or his own resigna- 
tion as president, and total separation from the concern. After a fair 
and full discussion on the whole subject, there was one vote wanting in 
the board to sustain Mr. Miner's position. In order, therefore, to be 
self consistent, maintain self respect, and secure his own safety as a busi- 
ness-man, he sold his stock in the bank — 810,000 — at ninety-five cents 
on the dollar, and resigned his office. 

He had now no object to detain him longer in Camden, except to ar- 
range his mercantile business, so that he could leave it. He therefore 
received into partnership his two brothers, Isaac and Heman, the former 



HIRAM J. MINER, OF NEW-YORK. 549 

of whom had been trading in Rome, but now removed his goods to 
Camden, and joined the firm. This left Mr. Miner at liberty, and at once 
he resolved to commence an individual bank, depending, under Provi- 
dence, upon his own resources and skill for success. But his retiring 
from Camden cost him the sacrifice of much feeling, and the sundering 
of many ties. He had been long engaged in business there, made all 
his property there, and formed many strong attachments there. The 
community had become endeared to him by unnumbered associations; 
they had ever treated him and his family with great kindness and con- 
sideration, and he could not leave them but with many regrets ; but his 
judgment taught him that he had better go, and he bade Camden an af- 
fectionate adieu. 

Immediately he began his arrangements for a bank on his own re- 
sponsibility. His resources were collected and prepared during the 
summer and autumn. In the course of the following winter his stock 
was purchased, and all his arrangements completed, and in March, 1850, 
he commenced the business of banking in Utica. 

Utica was an unfavorable point for an individual bank. He had 
there to compete with numerous and well-regulated banks of large capi- 
tal and long standing. He soon saw that, to make it profitable, he must 
either go into an association and increase the capital, or he must seek a 
new and unoccupied location. Many strong considerations urged him to 
the former course. He had spent about thirty years of his life in 
Oneida county. Here were the birthplace and the graves of his chil- 
dren — here, also, the graves of his parents and other friends, and long 
had he cherished the hope that here he might spend the residue of his 
life, and be laid at last by the side of those whom he loved. But to re- 
main in Utica, and form an associated institution, would be to abandon 
the governing principle of his whole business-life, viz., to act for himself 
untrammeled, and guided by his own views and judgment, irrespective 
of, and, if occasion required, in opposition to, the views and opinions of 
others. He could not entertain the thought of such a change. Every 
other consideration must yield to his fixed purpose of individual bank- 
ing. Accordingly, after examining other parts of the state, he directed 
his way to Chautauque county, and visited Fredonia. Here he was in- 
terested. Its central position in the lake border of the county — its 
proximity to Dunkirk,* the terminus of the New-York and Erie Rail- 
road — its rich farming lands, equal to any in the state — its merchants of 
the best class — its enterprise and stability apparent at a glance, toge- 
ther with its salubrity and exceeding beauty — all marked Fredonia as a 
desirable'place for an individual bank, and Mr. Miner fixed upon it. 

Having now chosen his location, he returned to Utica, and informed 
his family of the place selected for their new home. Immediately the 
trunks were packed and the baggage made ready, and the next day his 
house was closed, with the furniture all in its place, when, with his family, 
he stepped on board the cars, and was off for the West. They arrived 
in Fredonia, June 25, and took rooms at the " Johnson House" for some 
three months, until their furniture could be got up from Utica, and pre- 



* Three miles. 



550 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS, 

parations be made for keeping house. After a few days of necessary 
delay, " H. J. Miner's Bank of Utica" was opened for business in Fre- 
donia, July 4, 1850. 

Mr. Miner commenced his banking operations in Fredonia without 
an acting cashier ; but, to supply the deficiency, he requested the busi- 
ness-men of the place to make choice of some respectable gentleman to 
sign his bills as cashier, when an election took place, and the choice fell 
on Hon. John Crane, who signed the new bills up to January, 1852. 
At this time, Mr. James H. Madison, four years teller in the " Bank of 
Silver Creek," was employed, and entered on the duties of acting cashier. 

When he commenced at Fredonia, Mr. Miner knew but little of the 
mternal business of a bank, its correspondence, and especially the modes 
of keeping books. He was also an entire stranger in the town, and but 
very little known in the county. But he knew how to work. He had 
been accustomed to act long and untiringly in a straightforward mercan- 
tile course, and he believed that all which was necessary was to apply 
the same common-sense practical talent to the banking business, and 
success must crown the effort. 

During the first year and a half in this place he employed very little 
help, preferring to attend personally to the various duties of the bank, 
so as to learn exactly its wants, and familiarize himself with its detail 
processes ; in a word, he determined to understand his business, and 
therefore compelled himself to perform it in person. But it required a 
prodigious amount of effort. He was obliged to apply himself closely 
to labor not less than sixteen hours on a daily average in order to keep 
up. None but an iron-like constitution could have sustained such a 
draft upon body and mind for so long a time ; but he went on without 
giving much, if any, outward manifestation of unusual toil. 

His commencement of banking in some respects differed from, and 
in others much resembled, his commencement in merchandise. In respect 
to preparatory training it differed totally. His mercantile career was 
introduced by a long clerkship. In his banking he stepped directly from 
behind the merchant's counter to the cashier's desk, having no other ac- 
quaintance with the duties required than any bank director may acquire, 
which, for practical purposes, is really nothing at- all ; but in other re- 
spects there is a striking analogy. As in merchandise he took his stand 
among strangers, so in banking. His first mercantile operations were 
light, and conducted with much caution. The same was true in his 
banking. In the former case he commenced without a clerk, so in the 
latter. His mercantile business steadily advanced until it comprised 
an extensive trade : the same is true in the commencement, and is likely 
to be true in the issue, of his banking. His progress was at first gra- 
dual, but he advanced, step by step, with an increase of business 
almost daily perceptible, until now, after the short period of less 
than two and a half years, his business extends across the Atlantic, acid 
equals in discounts and deposits that of most of the associated banks of 
$100,000 capital. As in his mercantile career he laid aside antiquated and 
cumbrous forms, and led off in an unbeaten track, so in his banking. 
Having no previous acquaintance with the modus operandi of the busi- 
ness, but guided by his practical common sense, he arranges his books 
and accounts in the simplest manner, and aims to arrive at his point in 



HIRAM J. MINER, OF NEW-YORK. 551 

the shortest possible way. Thus he studies the convenience of both 
himself and his customer, regardless of old forms, which serve only to 
embarrass action, multiply clerks, mistlfy outsiders, and hinder pro- 
gress. 

Mr, Miner has entered on his banking career with an apparent deter 
mination to strip the business, as far as possible, of all mystery in the 
eyes of the people, to resist and subdue, at least in himself, its aristo- 
cratic tendencies, and make it as unembarrassing for the most simple 
and rustic person to approach the cashier's counter for business as the 
counter of a country merchant. That crabbed taciturnity which is some- 
times met with in other banks, and which is always so disgusting to men 
of sense, finds no place in the institution of Mr. Miner. He is always 
kind and complaisant, whether he is able to accommodate you or not, 
and seems to feel, when called on for business, that he is rather the 
obliged than the obliging party. His property does not appear to have 
inflated him at all, but he seems the same modest and accessible person 
as when, on the 6th of May, 1830, he opened his little store in the end 
of good Dea. Upson's tin-shop, with a capital of $270, all told ; and 
when he discounts your note it is with the same affable grace as when 
he pocketed the net profit of eight cents on the first article purchased 
from his store — a copy of the New Testament — sold for twenty-five 
cents, cash in hand. In keeping with this characteristic complaisance, 
he has especially desired the writer to speak of his sense of obligation to 
the citizens of Fredonia, and especially to the merchants and other busi- 
ness-men, for their early confidence, manifested by deposits and other- 
wise. And not only in the bank, but everywhere in social life, his bland 
and gentlemanly bearing has won for him the respect and esteem of this 
community ; while the writer, as his pastoi-, takes pleasure in attesting 
the high regard in which he is held by the religious society and church 
of which he is here a member. 

In conclusion, it may be instructive to inquire. What are the elements 
in Mr. Miner^s character to ivhich, under Providence, must he attributed his 
eminent success as a busitiess man- The writer has held extensive cor- 
respondence with persons who have known him long and intimately ; 
and from their letters may readily be gathered a satisfactory answer to 
this inquiry. 

Starr Clark, Esq., with whom his longest clerkship was served, says 
of him : " As a clerk in my store, his moral character, so far as I knew, 
was good. He was an attentive and good clerk, honest and upright; 
and one who attended to his own business." 

Mr. William Doxtater, of the former firm of " Doxtater and Burch," 
speaks as follows ; " I always esteemed him an honest, faithful young 
man, and remarkably trustworthy. He was likewise uncommonly 
active, mild, ambitious, and persevering as a salesman ; and seemed as 
anxious to promote the interest of his employer as his own, which I con- 
sider one of the most prominent traits in his character." Mr. Thomas 
Burch, the other partner, writes in a corresponding strain. 

Dr. Horatio G. Tarbert, of Camden, says : " Mr. Miner commenced 
business something more than twenty years ago in this place, and was, 
I believe, a poor boy. His motto was, ' ready pay ;' and by his un- 
tiring industry and indomitable perseverance, soon established the 



562 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

character of a successful merchant, and monopolized the trade. He was 
always very active, esteemed a useful citizen, and wielded an extensive 
influence." 

Mr. H. Brown, of Camden, writes as follows : " When Mr. Miner 
commenced business here, in the spring of 1830, there were but two or 
three merchantj in the place, which was then quite new; and ihey were 
selling goods very high. Mr. Miner put them down to Utica prices, 
and soon drew the largest part of the trade. I never heard any one say 
but that he dealt fairly and honestly. I have dealt with him, I think I 
may say, thousands of dollars, and I never thought he was dishonest 
with me. He was quite a public spirited man, did much in building 
up this place, and was very liberal with the religious societies." 

Mr. E. S. Dunbar, of Camden, says : " Mr, Miner was, we may 
say, almost the founder of our now flourishing village ; — a man of strict 
integrity — honest and upright in all his deal ; and for energy and enter- 
prise not often equaled. He was possessed of uncommon business tal- 
ent; a financier; and a benevolent and much respected citizen. His 
departure from Camden was much regretted at the time, and has been 
more deeply felt since." 

Mr. E. Rockwell, one of the directors of " The Camden Bank," 
writes : " Mr. Miner was a merchant of this village about twenty 
years, commencing without much capital or the aid of wealthy friends. 
But, by his own energy, stability, and close application to business, he 
succeeded in every undertaking ; and at the same time while he 
was making a fortune, he was gaining a character for strict integrity. 
Although a rapid advance of fortune sometimes creates envy, his integ- 
rity was admitted by all. Nor was he destitute of public spirit. To 
all improvements of the place which he approved, he gave liberally. I 
have often heard him referred to, to prove that it is no great misfortune 
to begin the world poor." 

Judge T. D. Penfield, of Camden, says: "As far as I am acquaint- 
ed, his habits and moral character were good ; and his charities and con- 
tributions to benevolent institutions and the poor were quite abundant. 
But he was more particularly noted for his business and financial traits 
of character. Few men apply themselves with greater diligence and 
perseverance than did Mr. Miner, and few are rewarded with more 
abundant success." 

Hon. Israel Stoddard, of Camden, says: "I have known Hiram J. 
Miner over twenty years. He is a self-made man. He came to this 
place about twenty-two years ago poor, and commenced a cash store. 
It was looked upon as 'no go ;' since a store of that kind was unheard 
of in this region. But his energy and decision of character overcame 
every obstacle. Go-ahead-ativeness seemed stamped on all his under- 
takings. He was sure to succeed. His business was never neglected. 
He was prompt in all his engagements ; of quick decision, and great 
firmness. I have done much business with him, and his honesty in deal 
was unquestionable. I consider him a man who feels for the poor. He 
has done much to build up this place ; yes, I may say, as much as all 
others combined. We feel his loss, and it is a great one ; but what is 
our loss is Fredonia's gain. Yes, I know him well. His untiring in 
dustry, kind words, and marked attention to customers, would attract 



HIRAM J. MINKR, OF NKW-YORK. 553 

your notice at once, and interest you in his favor. He has left in this 
place many warm friends who regret his departure from his old home 
and birthplace of business." 

Mr. James Button, at present, and for many years, a very respect- 
able merchant of Utica, writes as follows : " Yours of the 30th ultimo, 
requesting my views and opinion respecting the character of Hiram J. 
Miner, I have but just received. Although it is some eighteen or twenty 
years since 1 first became acquainted with Mr. Miner, still 1 must say 
that I have known him only as a business man. In all my commercial 
transactions with him, which in former years have been of no inconsider- 
able amount, he has ever seemed to be governed by the rules of strict 
honor and the most rigid integrity. From what I know of his habits, I 
should not attribute his success in business to what is usually termed 
'luck;' but rather to his great energy, and untiring perseverance. His 
mental constitution is of a turn essentially utilitarian. Hence his con- 
versation and inquiries, when allowed to take their natural or habitual 
direction, were uniformly on topics immediatefy connected with busi- 
ness. Possessing a brain-power apparently nowise superior to that of 
others less distinguished in business, he seems to have been able, by a 
concentration of that power, to render his will almost omnipotent; and 
to have been able to bring to bear upon a single point, with effect, only 
such an amount of power as is often expended by others without effect, 
when applied to a number of objects. To -will with him was synony- 
mous with to do. Convinced, in the management of his store, of the 
propriety of keeping an unbroken assortment of merchandise, his list was 
almost always kept full. When goods were wanted, and could be ob- 
tained, they were had, whether they could, at that particular time, be 
obtained at remunerating prices or not." 

We will detain the reader with but one more communication, which 
is from the pen of Mr. A. W. Ransom, a retired merchant, now of Cam- 
den. Mr. Kansom says: "Your favor of the 30th ultimo, asking my 
views of the character of our old and respected townsman, Hiram J. 
Miner, has been received. He has been connected closely with the rise 
and progress of our village, and his energy and thrift constitute one of 
its prominent landmarks. To one gifted in the analysis of character, 
his would form a fruitful and interesting theme. His career with us 
marked from the commencement an original and self reliant mind. He 
first became known to the inhabitants of Camden as ' the cash trader in 
the little yellow store.' He started as the enemy of the book-credit 
system, which was encouraged among the merchants of this then out- 
post of civilization. He found the small traders here selling goods on 
a scale of profits that would astonish the importer ; and readily saw 
that, by selling at a fliir price, people would purchase of him for cash; 
and while he was counting his gain in hard coin, his neighbors had only 
the pleasure of inventorying their notes and accounts. His capital soon 
grew from a few hundreds to as many thousands ; and customers and 
cash seemed to roll in upon him to his heart's content. He was able, 
like all successful business men, to read a customer — his wants, capaci- 
ties, and idiosyncracies — at the first glance. Consequently, he had pre- 
cisely what a customer wanted, and at just the price desired. The word 
' cEJi't' was not retained in his vocabulary. Nothing was impossible 



554 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

within the reach of human effort. His plans were to be executed, any- 
body's opinion to the contrary notwithstanding. He was public- 
spirited and liberal in all schemes for the improvement of the village; 
yet he often disregarded others, and set public opinion at defiance. 
The energy with which he pursued an object commonly resulted in dis- 
couraging all opposition, and he was left master of the field. This 
remarkable energy and positiveness of character, together wilh his 
master policy, was the secret of his success. No one doubted that a 
man who had shown himself so admirable a financier as a merchant 
must be successful as a banker. This latter career he has but just entered 
upon ; and his friends have the fullest confidence that his success in this 
will be no less marked and decided." 

The above are but a few of the many communications of a similar 
character which have been received from Camden and other places. 
But these are sufficient for our purpose; and will throw important 
light upon the minds of young men, respecting the elements of charac- 
ter and principles of action which have formed the basis and support of 
Mr. Miner's brilliant business career. 

In view of these testimonials and of the facts presented in the preced- 
ing narrative, the following characteristics are deemed especially worthy 
of being commended to the consideration of youth. 

1. Decided purpose. Mr. Miner has always had an object in view, 
and a decided purpose to attain it. There are those who seem to have 
no very definite aim or purpose in regard to any thing. They just 
give themselves up to the influence of circumstances as they may chance 
to arise, without any decided attempt to control and order circum- 
stances. Such persons never became truly men. Mr. Miner, when 
eight years old, said, " 1 will be a merchant." Here was a decided 
purpose ; and all his after-life has been regulated by definite design. 

2. Steadiness of purpose. He never could have attained his pre- 
sent position with shifting aims. Stability of design — adherence to 
settled plans — has marked all his career, and constituted an important 
element in the foundation of his prosperity. 

3. Industry. From his earliest youth he has always been active ; 
and when he could not obtain the employment he desired, he would en- 
gage in the best he could get. He would not be idle. Idleness is fatal to 
eminence in every thing honorable and good. This is the experience 
of the whole world. He who hopes to acquire wealth or honorable dis- 
tinction among men, without unabating industry, had better emigrate 
to the land of dreams. 

4. Patience. Mr. Miner would not be discouraged where there was 
a possible ground for hope. How long was he delayed in obtaining a 
clerkship ! How slow his progress to the head of a mercantile estab- 
lishment ! In what unpromising circumstances did he commence his 
independent business operations ! But in all the tedious path his hope 
never forsook him. He pressed on, and would not be disheartened. 
Nor did he allow himself to fret and complain because his ends were 
not more speedily attained. Calmly, patiently, he applied his industry, 
until Providence was pleased to grant his desire. 

5. Energy and perseverance. One of the main-springs of his prosper- 
ity is found in his unconquerable energy — his determination to succeed 



HIRAM J. MINER, OF NEW-TORK. 555 

in all he undertakes. He says of himself, " The expression ' Can't do 
it' I never could find use for. To do it is all I know ; and until it is ac- 
complished, I cease not to strive." 

6. Carefulness. Multitudes fail of success because they will not give 
themselves the trouble to maintain a watchful attention to their own 
affairs, or to the affairs of others with which they may be charged. 
They are heedless of consequences liable to result from inattention to 
little things ; and hence they are continually met by unlooked-for losses, 
perplexities and disasters. Mr. Miner, though quick in decision, and 
energetic and persevering in action, is never unmindful of little facts 
and circumstances — little interests and dangers which, as in the case of 
every one, continually surround him, and lie strewed along his path. 
To all these he is wakeful and attentive. Hence he seldom suffers any- 
thing from oversight, or is baffled by mishaps and vexations which 
worry and defeat the careless. 

7. Neatness and order. Both in his clerkship, and in the manage- 
ment of his own store, he would suffer no needless filth or rubbish to 
defile or encumber the area of his charge. Everything must wear a 
look of cleanliness, convenience and comfort. He would have " a place 
for everything," and " everything [must be] in its place." Thus were 
his premises made attractive to customers, and facile for his own pro- 
ceedings. 

8. Faithfulness. In his youth his employers found him reliable, 
and learned to confide in him. The remark of Mr. Doxtater is in point, 
"He seemfed as anxious to promote the interest of his employer as his 
own." In all his course, when an engagement had been made it must 
be met, and at the appointed time. No regard to his own ease or con- 
venience must be allowed to prevent. Promptness and punctuality — 
faithfulness to trust, have inspired public confidence, and thus given him 
advantage. 

9. Honesty and integrity. The tricks of trade by which the sim- 
ple are overreached, and the ignorant defrauded, he has religiously 
abjured from the first. Frankness, openness and honesty have been 
among the most strongly-marked traits in his character. His word 
could be relied on ; and customers soon learned that they could deal 
with him in any circumstances without danger of being cheated. 

10. Zeal for knowledge, and especially practical knowledge. See it 
in all his course, from the moment when, at six years of age, standing 
before his provoked and reproving school-mistress, he said to himself, "I 
will do better." See it in his eager desire for schooling when a lad in his 
teens. See it in his clerkship — the chief object sought in nearly or 
quite every change of employers. See it in the commencement of his 
banking operations. Useful knowledge— knowledge capable of being 
turned to practical account — he has been continually reaching after. In 
this way he becomes master of his business, and is enabled to succeed 
where other men would fail. 

11. Modesty. He never disgusts you with egotism or boasting. 
He never takes on airs of pomp or magisterial dignity. He never 
offends by officiously obtruding his counsel or service, nor by thrust- 
ing himself forward where he does not belong. His simplicity and 
modesty have done much to win for him favor and success. 



556 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

12. Kindness and generosity. In the language of Mr. Stoddard, 
"His kind words and marked attention to customers would attract 
your notice at once, and interest you in his favor." His sympathy for 
the poor has made him many friends. His considerate regard to their 
feelings and their welfare has embalmed his memory in many hearts. 
Whatever may be his zeal to acquire or retain wealth, he will not be 
mean for the sake of money. Service rendered him is sure to meet 
a liberal reward. And public interests do not appeal to him in vain, as 
the numerous testimonials from Camden show. All this reacts upon 
his own interests in a thousand favorable forms, and becomes to him an 
important source of prosperity. 

13. Catholicity in religion. He is an honest and decided Presbyte- 
rian, but lays no claim to infallibility in faith or practice. The rights 
of conscience he freely accords to every man ; and finds no difficulty in 
discovering much of good in religious communities differing in some 
important respects from his own. Hence, religious or sectarian preju- 
dices which might otherwise be arrayed against him are happily avoided, 
or enlisted in his favor. 

14. Mildness in politics. His democratic principles are, and have 
always been, unwavering. But the same spirit of gentleness and tole- 
ration towards those who differ with him which marks his religious ac- 
tion also characterizes his politics. Among his warmest personal friends 
are not a few of opposite political views from himself. 

15. Freedom from offi.ce-seeking . His own words are, 'I could never 
discover any charm in ofiice-seeking or office-holding. In the station of 
a private citizen I could see freedom of thought and opinion; but in 
office-seeking and office-holding only double-dealing, deception, bit- 
terness, anxiety, defeat, and at last poverty, and perhaps dishonor." 

16. Independence. Mr. Miner has always been accustomed to think 
for himself; and, since his majority, to act for himself Though he 
listens respectfully to the opinions, and notes carefully the practices of 
others, yet he fearlessly thinks, speaks and acts agreeably to his own 
convictions, whoever may object, or whatever may oppose. In making 
up his mind on a given subject, he never waits to learn first what others ■ 
think, or how others will act ; but, from his own stand point, views the 
matter in the clearest light he can get, and then decides, without regard 
to anybody else. 

17. Humility, or freedom from an aristocratic spirit. He never 
solicits especially the favor of the rich, nor despises the condition of the 
poor. The acquisition of wealth does not appear to have changed his 
sympathies or affinities at all. He seems to meet the poorest laborer 
as on a level ; while, in the presence of the wealthy and the great, he 
acknowledges frequent embarrassment. This accessibleness, or dispo- 
sition to fraternize with the mass of the people, procures him general 
favor, and makes him a peculiarly popular business-man. Of course it 
multiplies his business and increases his prosperity. 

18. Aspiring after progress. It does not seem to be so much a 
reaching after some definite point or object which he sees above or be- 
yond him, and which, for the time being, is the ultimatum of his desire, 
but when attained, is succeeded by another equally attractive — it does 
not seem to be with him so much this common characteristic of human 



HIRAM J. MINER, OF NETV YORK. 557 

nature, as an insatiable desire to progress for the sake of progression. 
He strives to advance because he craves advancement. His motto em- 
phatically is " Excelsior." It matters not what eminence he may reach 
in any respect, he struggles continually to go higher. This undying 
zeal to improve, ascend, progress, combined with his other characteris- 
tics, as developed above, has raised him from the lowest point of pov- 
erty and obscurity to the honorable and affluent position which he now 
occupies, and bids fair to advance him onward and upward while his 
faculties remain. 



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THOMAS NELSON, OF OKBOON. 559 

THOMAS NELSON, 

CHIEF JUSTICE OF ORKOOK, 

Was born at Peekskill, in Westchester County, New- York, on the 23d 
of January, 1819, and is, of course, now in the thirty-fourth year of his 
age. He is the third son of the Honorable William Nelson, late a re- 
presentative in Congress from the Eighth Congressional District of New- 
Yorii — a gentleman whose earnest and successful devotion to the labo- 
rious profession of law in early life, and practical wisdom as a politician 
and statesman, as well as his virtues as a man of principle, have won 
him the suffrages and respect of a large majority of his fellow-citizens, 
who have several times testified by popular vote their confidence in his 
principles, public spirit, and private worth. 

As a youth, and during the earlier years of boyhood, young Nelson 
was the subject of those wholesome family influences which give the 
right direction to moral character ; and to early parental precept and 
example may, doubtless, be traced, in a large measure, the germs of 
that honorable and manly ambition which now distinguishes Judge 
Nelson as a public man. 

Mr. Nelson graduated at Williams College, in 1836, at the early age of 
seventeen ; and although it has always been with him a matter of regret 
since that he entered college so young, yet he distinguished himself as 
a scholar, and graduated honorably as a boy of great promise, /or he was 
then hut a hoy. It was, therefore, thought advisable, before entering 
on his clerkship as a student at law, that he should continue the scien- 
tific and literary habits he had formed in college by prosecuting his 
studies for some time longer in the city of New- York. He there chose 
his residence in the family of a French gentleman, a professor of the 
French language and literature, that he might have the opportunity of 
acquiring not only a thorough theoretic knowledge of that language, but 
a correct idiomatic use of it, while at the same time he attended, as an 
amateur^ a regular course of lectures at the Medical College in that city, 
giving his attention chiefly, however, to the study of anatomy and 
physiology. 

A love of general knowledge, and a desire for liberal and elegant 
culture, have always been marked characteristics of Mr. Nelson's mind, 
and given scope to his general reading and studies ; for though a successful 
student and practitioner of law, and not undistinguished at the bar, he 
is still more remarkable as a general scholar, having a full, ready, and 
well-furnished mind, to which refined culture has added the grace of a 
polished literary and sesthetic taste. 

Having completed this course of medical lectures, he entered his 
father's office as a student at law, where he continued until he was of 
age, when he was admitted to the bar of the Supreme Court of New- 
York ; and, in due time, he was also admitted as a counselor of the 
same court, a solicitor and counselor of the Court of Chancery of that 
state, and an attorney and counselor of the Supreme Court of the United 
States. 



500 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

After Mr. Nelson had finished his professional studies, and before en- 
tering on the practice of the law, he expressed a strong desire to visit 
the old world. He had in this a twofold purpose : one was to in- 
crease his general health by travel ; and the other, to gain that knowl- 
edge of men and things which books cannot give. In this wish his 
family and friends very readily acquiesced. And Mr. Nelson accord- 
ingly spent the greater part of the year 1842 in England and Conti- 
nental Europe, making himself familiar with every thing during his 
travels which he thought would be most useful to him, as a well-read 
and well-informed man. 

This tour not only afforded him opportunity for personal observation 
on the present condition of European society and institutions, but it 
gratified and strengthened that taste for classic scenes and reminiscences 
with which his academic and collegiate studies had early inspired him. 
As a scholar, however, Mr. Nelson's knowledge is by no means limited 
to the acquirements of a college class-room. He has made himself, in 
the broad sense of the word, a scholar, by a critical study of the English 
classics, and an extensive acquaintance with the literature of modern 
Europe, 

Mr. Nelson's temperament and refined taste, as well as his correct 
moral judgments, naturally incline him to a quick and instinctive admi- 
ration of beauty, goodness and truth in character, as well as in art and 
literature. This was early manifested when, at the age of seventeen, he 
chose for the theme of the oration assigned him when he graduated, 
'• The character of John /«y,"~a choice which showed that young Nel- 
son had, from his earliest recollections, not only loved and admired in 
Gov. Jay the scholar, the patriot, the jurist, and the statesman, but that 
he also reverenced the Christian as the highest style of the man. The 
oration was well conceived, and delivered in an easy and graceful man- 
ner. As a whole, it would have been creditable to a graduate of 
maturer years, for it gave to all unmistakable evidences that he was 
destined, ultimately, to rank among the distinguished men of the com- 
monwealth and the country as a man of capacity, principle, and untiring 
industry. 

On Mr. Nelson's return from his European tour, he entered vigor- 
ously on his profession, (as a partner with his father in Westchester 
county,) which he pursued with great success until he was appointed 
Chief Justice of Oregon, in January, 1851, when he entered upon his 
duties as a judge of that distant territory. 

Mr. Nelson has, as the lawyers call it, a good legal mind, clear and 
discriminating — fond of investigation, and whilst he has a dislike to 
what is called the drudgery of his profession, yet during his practice of 
the law, he invariably prepared his cases with such care and research, 
that he was always ready for any emergency in the progress of the trial 
of his causes. lie was ardent and persevering, and invariably summed 
up his causes before a jury with ability, and not unfrequently with 
great force and eloquence. 

At the bar of the court of his native state he discussed questions of 
law with a clearness and ability, manifesting a research and a knowledge 
of the reasons and principles of law greatly beyond his years. During 
the few years he has been engaged in his profession, he has earned a 



THOMAS NELSON, OF OREGON. 561 

reputation as a skilful advocate, an eloquent speaker, and a lawyer, 
such as but few of his age have attained. His manners and address, 
as a public speaker, as well as in his private intercourse with his friends 
and fellow-citizens, are modest, courteous and ag^reeable. His social 
and domestic character is faultless. His truthfulness and integrity are 
unquestioned and unquestionable. Few men are held in higher esti- 
mation by those who know him, as a gentleman of refined manners, a 
ripe scholar and a lawyer of no ordinary attainments. 

As the Chief Justice of Oregon, Mr. Nelson has prored himself to be 
all that his friends desired or expected of him, faithful to duty, capable, 
and of unflinching integrity. Unfortunately for Oregon, in the course of 
the last year an exciting controversy sprung up among the people of 
that territory concerning the location of its seat of government, whether 
it was by law at Oregon city or Salem. This as a legal and constitu- 
tional question came before the Supreme Court of the territory for its 
adjudication, and a majority of that court (Judges Nelson and Strong) 
held and so decided that by law the seat of government was Oregon 
city. But a majority of the members of the legislature of that terri- 
tory chose to regard Salem as the seat of government, and acted ac- 
cordingly. This of course produced much excitement and confusion in 
Oregon. Whatever the merits of the question as to where the seat of 
government, as a matter of expediency, ought to be, no sensible and 
unprejudiced man, certainly no good lawyer^ who had examined the ques- 
tion, could doubt, at the time it was presented to the court for its adju- 
dication, that by law the seat of government was Oregon city. And 
the court being called on to decide, not from considerations of policy 
or expediency, but by those rules that should always govern in settling 
a legal and constitutional question, we cannot see how Judges Nelson 
and Strong, as intelligent and impartial jurists, could have decided other- 
wise than they did. And, indeed, such is the opinion generally ex- 
pressed by the best lawyers who have looked at the subject. 



36 




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ois-: or "j'.r: juDsr.:-: o?' rjij-: circl:'.' cozlh::' 



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ANDREW J. MAK0HBANK8, OF TENNESSEE. 563 

ANDREW J. MARCHBANKS, 

OF TENNESSEE. 

The subject of this sketch was bom in Jackson county, Tennessee, on 
the 21st of November, 1804. During his infancy his parents removed 
with him to, and settled in Overton county. His father, William 
Marchbanks, was of Scotch descent, was a farmer in moderate circum- 
stances, had a large family, and his sons were compelled to labor in the 
field for a support. The present judge was, from time to time, sent to 
school until he acquire<J a tolerable knowledge of the sciences and an im- 
perfect knowledge of Latin. 

In 1823, and in his nineteenth year, he commenced the study of the 
law, under Major H. H. Atkinson, in the town of Monroe, the county 
seat of Overton county. There he continued to read with but little 
advantage until the summer of 1824 ; and having at that time become 
quite idle, and being satisfied that he was doing no good, he determined 
upon, and accordingly returned to the residence of his father, taking 
with him a few law-books, and which he occasionally read until the early 
part of the winter of 1825, at which time he resolved to r^new his stu- 
dies with increased energy ; and to do this, he thought it best to avoid 
relapsing into his former idle habits, to select a new location at a place 
where he would have no acquaintances, and where, without the danger 
of any evil temptations, he might form new acquaintances and new 
habits. It was with determinations of this kind that young Marchbanks 
again, in the early part of February, 1825, left his father's roof He 
located himself in the town of McMinnville, and there re-commenced his 
studies under Major Stokeley D. Romer, a gentleman of considerable 
celebrity and distinction at the bar. Our student now, in good faith, gave 
up all of his former idio habits, and with singleness of purpose devoted 
himself to his studies, and so continued to do until the fall of that year, 
when he was licensed to practise law. 

At this period his license to practise law constituted his all — it was 
his only hope ; and the want of the means to go elsewhere, as much as 
anything else, induced him to make a permanent settlement at McMinn- 
ville, and there to make an effort, humble as he was, to establish him- 
self in his profession. Under such circumstances as these, young 
Marchbanks, without a dollar in the world, and without family connec- 
tion or patronage of any kind to usher him into business, embarked in 
his profession ; — his only hope for success was a determination on his 
part to devote himself to its duties with unwearied industry, and to live 
an upright and an honorable life. 

In a short time after he was licensed he got into a small practice, 
principally in the county courts. ' For two years his business did not 
yield a sufficient income to defray his expenses. About the expiration 
of that time he got into a profitable practice, and which he continued 
down to the time when he was elevated to the bench. 

In 1828, Marchbanks was elected elector from his native district to 
■ vote for President and Vice-President of the United States, and which 



664 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

duty he performed by casting the vote of his district for Jackson and 
Calhoun. The Electoral College of Tennessee was at that time consti- 
tuted of eleven members. Of the entire number of persons then con- 
stituting it, it is believed the subject of this memoir, together with Dr. 
Alfred Flournoy, at present of Shreveport, Louisiana, constitute the 
only survivors. 

In 1836 he was elected to the Senate in the state legislature, and - 
served in the called session of that year. 

In 1837, March banks was elected by a whig legislature (he being a 
democrat) judge of the thirteenth circuit in Tennessee for the term of 
eight years ; and upon the expiration of that term, in 1845, he was 
again, by the unanimous vote of the legislature, re-elected for the same 
term, and which office he now holds. 

In his addresses to the grand juries he has constantly impressed upon 
them the fact, that our government is founded upon the morals and intelli- 
gence of our citizens, and that, to perpetuate our free institutions, the 
religion and intelligence of our people must also be perpetuated ; that 
only a few brief days ago the government was in the hands of our fa- 
thers ; that to-day it is in our hands, and that in a very few more days 
it will be in the hands of our children ; and as it is to devolve upon 
them to sustain it, it is all-important that they should be well prepared 
to perform that high and important duty, and that, to so prepare them, 
the most anxious and unremitting care should be bestowed upon their 
education. 

In the earlier part of the judge's professional service, he was, as as- 
sisting counsel, retained in several heavy and complicated actions of 
ejectment. This caused him at that early period of his life to give to 
the land law of his state a thorough examination. He has now been 
upon the bench for more than fourteen years, and during that time he 
has decided many actions of ejectment, a number of which have gone to 
the Supreme Court by appeal, and out of that number only two have 
been reversed. One of them is the case of Miller vs. Miller, (Meig's 
Reports, 484,) and the other Wait's Lessee vs. Dolly, (8th Humphrey's 
Reports, 192 ;) and in deciding the latter case, it was at the time be- 
lieved that he was following the judgment of the Supreme Court in the 
case of Lee vs. Crossna, 6th Humphrey's Reports, 281. 

As a judge, he makes it a rule never to decide a case, where there is 
any doubt about the law of it, without an examination into the authori- 
ties, when it is at all practicable to do it. He also makes it a rule, in all 
cases of any magnitude, to give to the juries who try them written in- 
structions in regard to the law of the case, and to make out and keep 
full notes of the evidence, insomuch that, in many cases of the utmost 
importance, where appeals have been taken from his judgments, the par- 
ties have adopted his notes as containing a full history of the case. 

The Judge was first married to a Miss Savage ; she dying, he then 
married his present wife, Mrs. Martha C. Flournoy, daughter of the late 
Doctor John H. Camp, of Giles County. 

He lives upon a farm within about two miles of McMinnville, where 
his intelligent lady employs her time in the raising and cultivation of 
flowers and shrubbery. 





7: 




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OF tennessi:f. 



J^ToipvcvKd. i'lr ji'iTAjqr,-ipiii..-:rJ^. .^' 



ARCHIBALD WALLER OVERTON, OF TENNESSEE. 565 



/ 

ARCHffiALD WALLER OVERTON, 

OF TENNESSEE. 

The subject of this memoir is a native of Virginia, and descended 
from an ancient and highly respectable family. His paternal grand- 
father, Capt. James Overton, emigrated from England sometime prior 
to the Revolutionary war, and settled in the then colony of Virginia, 
where he intermarried with Ann Waller, whose father was also a 
native of England, and a relation of the distinguished English poet. 
Waller. She bore him five sons, three of whom participated in the 
Revolutionary struggle for independence. 

The eldest of these was Waller, the father of the subject of this 
notice, who served an apprenticeship with a carpenter, named Dabney 
Minor. 

After the expiration of the term of his apprenticeship he worked at 
his trade several years, and received as the consideration for his 
labor continental money, which ultimately became valueless m his 
possession. 

This circumstance disgusted him with his trade, which he immediately 
abandoned, and determined to seek his fortune in the wilds of Kentucky. 

He accordingly left his native home and repaired to that country, 
which was still occupied by many of the aborigines, and was an almost 
trackless wilderness in 1776. Here he became acquainted with the 
memorable Daniel Boone, with whom he associated about twelve 
months, sharing with him his toils and his dangers. During this 
perilous adventure, he was present and witnessed at Boonesboro' the 
celebration of the first marriage ever consummated among the white 
population of that country. He also built a log-cabin, and cultivated 
a crop of corn, in the now neighborhood of Lexington, which, under 
the existing laws, entitled him to a claim of a settlement and pre- 
emption. 

After completing his cabm, and the cultivation of his crop, he 
returned to Virginia, where he soon after intermarried with Martha Rag- 
land, the daughter of Major Samuel Ragland, a respectable and wealthy 
farmer of Louisa county, Virginia. The fruit of this union was six 
sons and four daughters. Archibald Waller Overton, their second son, 
and subject of this memoir, was born on the 12th day of August, 1783, 
in Louisa county, Virginia. Soon after this his father removed from 
Virginia to his new home in the vicinity of Lexington, Kentucky^ 
where he permanently settled and resided until his death. Archibald 
Waller was sent by his father to a common English school in the 
neighborhood, at which he learned to read, write, and cypher to the 
" rule of three." In a short time afterwards he was sent to a grammar 
school, where he studied the Latin and Greek languages under the 
tuition of an eminent linguist by the name of Dunlevi. At the age of 
sixteen or seventeen years he was entered as a student in the Transyl- 
vania University, where he remained until he graduated, and left it 
with distinguished credit, as a young gentleman of talent and high 
promise. 



566 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

In a short time after leaving the University he entered upon the 
study of the law, under the direction and supervision of the Hon. 
Henry Clay, to whom he is greatly indebted for his kind attention, 
care, and patronage, in early life ; and for whose public and private 
character he entertains the most profound respect. At that time Mr. 
Clay was in the zenith of his power, as a lawyer and a statesman, and 
as an advocate he stood unrivaled in the western hemisphere. 

For the benefit of his students, he organized a moot court in which 
fictitious suits of every description were instituted — the pleadings 
regularly and technically made up, and every step taken in the causes, 
from the original writ to final judgment and execution. This court was 
eminently useful in imparting to the student a knowledge of plead- 
ing, and the practice generally. 

He also organized a legislature, composed of his law-students, in which 
committees were appointed, bills introduced and amended, referred, and 
reported upon, by the appropriate committees, and all the regular steps 
taken to eflect the passage of a bill in conformity to the requirements 
of the " Lex Parliamentaria." Jefferson's Manual was always referred 
to as the ruling authority on the subject of parliamentary law. Mr. 
Clay often presided as speaker of the body, in which capacity he spared 
no pains in his endeavors to facilitate his students in the acquirement ot 
a thorough knowledge of parliamentary law. Mr. Overton was a strict 
attendant upon the moot court, and a prominent and leading member 
of the legislature ; in both of which he was esteemed a student ol 
unusual talent and promise. 

These two fruitful sources of information greatly facilitated the prog- 
ress and improvement of Mr. Overton in the acquirement of all the 
elements of legal and parliamentary learning, necessary to constitute 
a scientific lawyer. 

By the eminent example presented in the distinguished person 
of Mr. Clay, together with an intimate communion and frequent inter- 
course with him, and being pleased with his style, his manner and ad- 
dress, he selected him as his model. In the year 1805, his uncle, 
Judge John Overton, invited him to visit Tennessee ; he accepted the 
invitation, and in the fall of that year arrived at the residence of his 
uncle in the vicinity of Nashville, without means, without friends or 
acquaintances, when, by the advice and solicitation of his uncle, he re- 
mained in his office for the space of twelve or eighteen months, revising 
and extending his legal reading ; during which time he made himself 
acquainted with the statutes of the state, and acquired a thorough 
knowledge of the duties of a clerk in the office of the late Eandal 
McGavock, Esq., at that time the clerk of Mero district court — a man 
of eminent worth, and perhaps the most accomplished clerk in the state. 

About the same time, a new district was laid oflT and organized 
in Middle Tennessee, by the name of Winchester District, composed of 
the counties of Franklin, Warren, White, Overton, Jackson and Smith; 
the court to be holden at Carthage, in the county of Smith. 

Mr. Overton being a good clerk in theory, became a candidate for the 
clerkship, opposed by several young gentlemen of talent and high 
character — over whom he was unanimously elected. At that time the 
county courts possessed an almost unlimited jurisdiction, both in civil 
and criminal cases. 



ARCHIBALD WALLER OVERTON, OF TENNESSEE. 567 

After his election to the clerkship, he immediately applied for and 
obtained a license to practice the law, and commenced his professional 
career ; — his circuit embracing the six counties composing the district of 
Winchester. These counties had been newly laid off, and the places of 
holding their respective courts, fixed and established by legislative 
enactment. New clerks were appointed, who knew little or nothing of 
their duties, and Mr. Overton, being fresh from the office of McGavock, 
was enabled to give them all the necessary instructions. He accord- 
ingly boarded with the clerks, and after the adjournment of the court, 
he often sat up all night making their entries for them, and instructing 
them in the proper manner of making up their records ; and in 
the morning, at the opening of the court, he was at his post at the bar, 
ready to attend to the business of his clients. In this way he paid his 
board on the first circuit he attended as a lawyer. His practice soon 
became large and lucrative, and in the course of a few years there were 
but few causes in his circuit, either civil or criminal, in which he was not 
retained. In the month of March, 1810, he intermarried with Mary 
Greenway Dixon, the eldest daughter of Major Tilman Dixon, a dis- 
tinguished officer in the war of the Revolution. He was at the siege of 
Charleston and the storming of Stony Point, under the command of Gen. 
Wayne, at which latter place he was severely wounded ; when Wayne 
fell, being stricken down by a glancing musket-ball, Major D. assisted 
in bearing him into the fort. Major Dixon had three brothers and two 
nephews in the service from the beginning to the close of the war. 
After his marriage Col. Overton removed to Carthage, in Smith county, 
where he settled himself in possession of an extensive and profitable 
practice, until a change in the judiciary system took place. The Dis- 
trict Courts were abolished, and Circuit and Supreme Courts established 
in their stead. One of the Supreme Courts sat at Carthage, and Col. 
Overton was elected as its clerk, which office he held until the 
year 1823 — at the same time exercising his profession in the Cir- 
cuit and County Courts of the six counties above named, assisted by 
his brother, John W. Overton, as his deputy in the clerk's office, 
who in the mean time studied the law with him. 

In the year 1823 he resigned his commission as clerk of the Supreme 
Court, and was elected to a seat in the senate of the state for the county 
of Smith, and served as a member of that body during the regular ses- 
sion of 1823 and the called session of 1824. After the close of the ses- 
sion of 1824, Col. Overton returned to his constituents, (who gave the 
strongest indications that they had been ably and faithfiilly represented,) 
and resumed the practice of his profession with zeal and diligence, and 
continued to do so until the year 1829. In the mean time (about the 
year 1828) he was appointed by General Samuel Houston, then gover- 
nor of Tennessee, judge of the fourth judicial circuit of the state. 

Being however at this time in possession of an extensive practice, 
and the important interests of numerous clients demanding his personal 
attention, he declined its acceptance. After this period, in the year 
1829, he was again elected to a seat in the house of representatives of 
Tennessee from the county of Smith. After the close of the session of 
1829 he again returned home and resumed the practice of his profes- 
sion, (which still continued to increase,) until 1836, when his private 



568 SKETCHES OF SMINEKT AMERICANS. 

business becoming onerous and extensive, and requiring his exclusive 
attention, he declined the practice of the law, removed to his farm on 
the bank of the Cumberland River in the neighborhood of Carthage, 
where he now resides with his family in the enjoyment of good health, 
both of body and mind, with ample means to afford him all the com- 
forts of life — the common reward of industry and a faithful and honora- 
ble practice of the legal profession. 

Col. Overton has shared the providential destiny of many of his illus- 
trious predecessors — he has no issue — which situation he sustains with 
cheerfulness and contentment. In his legislative service in the senate 
and house of representatives of the state, he was placed on the most 
important committees, took an active and prominent part in preparing 
and advocating some of the most important and leading measures passed 
and adopted during the three sessions in which he was a member of 
those bodies, particularly in fixing and settling the policy of the state 
in relation to the disposition of her public domain, thereby affording to 
the poor and indigent classes an opportunity of obtaining a freehold by 
occupancy and pre-emption at a small expense. He warmly and ably 
advocated the penitentiary system which was adopted during the ses- 
sion of 1829, and is now the settled law of Tennessee. He was con- 
sidered an able and eloquent debater and an attentive and diligent 
member — always advocating with commendable zeal the interests of 
his own immediate constituency. He practised the law twenty-five or 
thirty years in the now fourth judicial circuit, formerly the district of 
Winchester ; has been stationary in his residence during that period, 
and now resides in the same county in which he commenced his legal 
career. Few men have shared more liberally in the public confidence 
and patronage as a lawyer. Even to the close of his professional life, 
he was employed in many highly important criminal cases in which the 
superiority of his powers as an orator and advocate were most strongly 
evinced. In the case of the State vs. Ragland, indictment for murder, 
tried in the Circuit Court of Warren county at McMinville, at — term 
18 — , Judge Stewart on the bench, on a change of venue from the 
county of Smith, he appeared alone as counsel for Ragland. The case 
was one of deep interest and highly excited feeling, the prosecutor and 
defendant both respectable, witnesses subpoenaed and in attendance 
from distant parts of the country, and the most eminent lawyers em- 
ployed to assist the attorney-general in the prosecution. Under these 
trying and dangerous circumstances to the accused. Col. Overton ap- 
peared as counsel for the defendant. I will not attempt an analysis of 
the case — it would be inconsistent with the scope and design of the 
narrative of which this memoir is intended to be only a brief. The 
defendant was honorably acquitted, and it was conceded by all who 
heard the defence, — the bench, the bar, the jury and the bystanders, — 
that the defence of Col. Overton surpassed in ability and eloquence any 
effort they had ever heard on a similar occasion. This was one amongst 
the last causes of importance in which he appeared at the bar. As an 
evidence of his unusual and almost unparalleled success as an advocate, 
no case can be found upon the records of the courts in the circuit, in 
which he practised for nearly thirty years, in which his client was con- 
victed of a capital felony. He adopted a general rule in his criminal 



ARCHIBALD WALLER OVERTON, OF TENNESSEE. 569 

practice from which he never departed, which was, never to be employed 
on the part of the state in the prosecution, fearful that perchance he 
might be instrumental in the conviction of an innocent man — always 
bearing in mind the humane and merciful principle inculcated by Lord 
Mansfield, that it was "much better that ninety-nine guilty persons 
should go unpunished, than that one innocent man should suffer." His 
speeches at the bar, when occasion seemed to justify and require it, 
were replete with wit and satire, severe invective, and the most bitter 
and scathing sarcasm. A case occurred in the county of Jackson many 
years ago — it was a suit instituted by a Yankee doctor before a justice 
of the peace against an old Irishman, to recover the amount of a medi- 
cal bill for services rendered by the doctor to the son of the old Irish- 
man while he was at school. 

The Irishman boarded his son in Gainsboro', the county seat of Jack- 
son county, in order that he might be convenient to the school. The 
doctor, who had recently arrived there from Massachusetts, and located 
in the town for the purpose of practising his profession, boarded at the 
same house with the Irish boy. The doctor soon became intimate with 
the lad, and proposed to him that if he would feed and attend to his 
horse, that he (the doctor) would, in the event the boy should be sick, 
attend him as his physician. The proposition was acceded to by the 
lad, and the contract consummated between the parties. The contract 
was strictly and faithfully complied with on the part of the boy ; the 
Yankee's horse was fed, watered, curried and rubbed daily, and he soon 
became as fat as a seal and as sleek as a mole. In two or three months 
after the contract was made, the lad was attacked with bilious fever, or 
some other manageable disease. The doctor accordingly attended him 
for a few days and he recovered his health. Not long after this, the 
doctor presented his patient's father with an exorbitant medical ac- 
count for services rendered his son, which the old man refused to pay. 
A suit was brought by the doctor against the old man before a justice 
of the peace, where he recovered the amount of his account. An ap- 
peal was taken to the County Court, where the result was the same. It 
was then taken to the Circuit Court by appeal. When the cause was 
called for trial, all the parties being ready, the old Irishman went to 
Col. O., and desired to know how much he would charge him to appear 
in his behalf in the cause. To this Col. O. replied, that it was then too 
late to be employed ; he knew nothing of the character of the case, the 
testimony, &c., and that it was then too late to obtain the necessary 
information. The old man, who appeared very much excited, replied, 
that he had already one lawyer employed who would do the bulk of 
the speaking, but that " he wished to employ him to give the doctor's 

pedigree to the jury." Overton told him that for dollars he 

would attend to and argue that branch of the cause. The old man 
without hesitation agreed to pay the required fee. The cause was 
opened by the plaintiff's counsel, who presented and read the doctor's 
medical account, the items of which were written in good or bad Latin. 
Overton directed his client to have all the doctors in the village sum- 
moned instanter, which was accordingly done. Their examination as to 
the meaning or true construction of the account was ludicrous beyond 
description. One gave it one construction, another a different construe- 



670 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

tion, while a third gave it a meaning different from them both. The 
plaintiff's counsel knew nothing of the Latin language, and therefore 
was unable to explain the meaning of the bill ; nor was either of his 
compeers better informed. The testimony having closed, the plaintiff's 
counsel opened the cause and virtually surrendered it, there being no 
testimony to sustain it. Col. O. said it was a plain case of mutual 
contract between the parties, that his client had, in every particular, 
faithfully performed his part of the contract, as the testimony incontro- 
vertibly showed ; and upon that ground the defendant ought to be dis- 
charged. But he would ask the indulgence of the court and jury to 
submit a few remarks in relation to the " medical bill," and the charac- 
ter and conduct of its author. Here he portrayed the Yankee charac- 
ter in its true and native colors. He said, that he had read of "wooden 
nutmegs," and a case in which one Yankee had stolen the grave of his 
neighbor, and many others of a " similar stripe," but this " bill," and 
the circumstances under which it originated, exceeded them all in 
point of fraud, ingratitude and atrocity. The " bill" itself, " fcr ««," 
bore on its face every vestige, and was clothed with every badge of 
fraud and corruption known to the law ; made out and exhibited in a 
foreign language against an aged and illiterate Irishman, whether it was 
written in Latin, Greek or Hebrew no witness could tell, not even his 
own compeers, and gentlemen of his own profession. He said that such 
a doctor required a doctor, and that the jury would do justice and their 
duty by medicating him with a verdict against him. The arguments of 
counsel having closed, the jury retired, and in a few minutes returned 
with a verdict in favor of the defendant, to the great gratification of all 
present, the doctor excepted, who looked as if he had a short time pre- 
vious swallowed an aperient which was then about to operate. He left 
the court in a rage, leaving the balance of the case, as to the costs, which 
were heavy, to be adjusted and settled between himself and the sheriff. 
Very many incidents in the early part of Col. Overton's life evinced a 
strong proclivity and peculiar adaptation of his mind to the profession 
which he selected. 

While at Transylvania University, one of the professors became ob- 
noxious to the charge of malfeasance in office. A meeting of the stu- 
dents was held — a committee was appointed by them to draft the 
charges and specifications against the professor, and to take the neces- 
sary steps and adopt such measures as might be deemed proper to 
bring the professor before the board of trustees of the university. 
Overton, who was then not more than 17 or 18 years of age, was se- 
lected, in connection with several other students of distinction, to pre- 
pare and conduct the proceedings before the board of trustees — the 
board being composed of gentlemen of the first intelligence and charac- 
ter in the country, his father being among the number. The case pro- 
duced great popular excitement and deep interest among the friends of 
the professor and the parents and friends of the students. The profes- 
sor was a Presbyterian clergyman, and had, to a very great extent, en- 
listed the feelings and solicitude of the church in his favor. 

The trial of the case continued ten or fifteen days, and brought to- 
gether people of every class and denomination, from all parts of the 
country, anxious to hear the result. Young Overton, as a member of 



AaCHIBALD WALLER OVERTON, OF TENNESSEE, 5*71 

the committee, acted a very prominent part in the preparation of the 
charges and specifications, the management of the testimony, and the 
examination of the witnesses before the board. His argument on the 
occasion was, for a youth, esteemed eloquent and forcible. 

After the examination of the testimony, and the arguments for and 
against the professor closed, the board took time to advise, and in a 
short time came to the conclusion that the professor ought to be dis- 
missed, and he was dismissed accordingly. Young Overton acquired 
great credit and applause for his distinguished talent, tact, and eloquence, 
in the management of the case, both from the board of trustees and au- 
dience. Another and still more remarkable case occurred in his early 
history, evincing, most clearly, his eminent capacity and fitness for his 
profession. In the year 1805, while on his way, for the first time, to 
Tennessee, he called at Glasgow, then a small village, immediately on 
the road from Lexington to Nashville, in the county of Barren, Ky., 
where his eldest brother, Thomas J. Overton, then resided, and prac- 
tised the law. He arrived there late in the evening, and put up for the 
night at the inn of a Mr. Dickerson, a Virgiman, a justice of the peace, 
and a social and hospitable man. 

His brother and all the lawyers who resided in the village were ab- 
sent at court in another county. On the morning after his arrival, an 
old man, whose name the writer does not now recollect, came to the inn 
and inquired of the proprietor where he could find a lawyer. Mr. D. 
informed him that they were all absent. The old man seemed much 
distressed, and observed that he knew not what he should do ; that his 
son John, about seventeen or eighteen years of age, had, on the day pre- 
vious, been arrested, and was then in custody of the sheriff, on a charge 
of biting off the nose of James Fowler, and he feared it would go hard 
with him unless he could find a lawyer, Dickerson told him that it was 
an unfortunte situation to be placed in, but that a young gentleman had 
arrived there the night before, who he understood was a lawyer, and 
that he had better apply to him. The old man was accompanied by 
Mr. D. to the room of young Mr. O,, and introduced to him — made a 
statement of his son's case to Mr. O., and informed him that he wished 
to employ him to defend his son before the called or Examining Court, 
which was to sit on that day at the court-house in Glasgow. Mr. O, in- 
formed the old man that he had no license to practise the law — that he 
was traveling to Tennessee — that he had been reading law, but had 
never appeared in any court or in any cause, and that he did not consi- 
der himself qualified to do justice to his son in his defence, and advised 
him to obtain a continuance of the case. The old man still insisted, in 
the most earnest manner, aided by Mr. Dickerson, until Mr. Overton 
agreed to appear, not as a lawyer, but as a friend, in defence of. his son. 
He procured the key of his brother's office, found 4th Blackstone's Com- 
mentaries, and some other books on criminal law, and appeared at the 
bar of the court, at its opening, with the old man and his son at his 
back. When the testimony was closed, both on the part of the state 
and the defendant, it appeared that a quarrel had taken place between 
the prosecutor and defendant ; provoking language passed on both sides, 
and a fight ensued, in which the defendant was knocked down, the prosecu- 
tor jumped upon him, and commenced gouging him with both his thumbs 



572 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

in defendant's eyes. In this situation, underneath, and suffering un'^er 
the pain and torture of the gouging operation, he threw up his head, and 
snapped off about an inch of the prosecutor's nose. Who struck the 
first blow, or commenced the fight, did not appear in the proof on either 
side. Mr. O., in his argument, made it appear, to the satisfaction of 
the court, from the law and the facts, that it was most clearly a case of 
" son assault demesne," and that if death had ensued it would have been 
a case of justifiable homicide — "se defendendo" — and therefore the de- 
fendant ought to be discharged ; and such was the opinion of the court, 
and the defendant was discharged accordingly. This was the first time 
that Mr. Overton ever appeared in or addressed a court without prepa 
ration, and without a license. Unlike most men of his acknowledged 
ability and merit, he does not aspire to political elevation, believing as 
he does that the employment of those means generally used, and well 
calculated to insure the success of the politician, are inconsistent with the 
feelings of an honorable and just man. He adheres firmly to the demo- 
cratic creed, as adopted and pursued by Jefferson, Madison, Monroe, 
and Jackson. He advocated and sustained the administrations of these 
illustrious statesmen to the extent of his capacity. He voted for Jackson 
when a candidate for the United States Senate, and supported his ad- 
ministration throughout. He was Jackson's intimate acquaintance and 
warm personal friend until his death. He is thoroughly conversant with 
constitutional and international law, as well as the form and structure 
of the American government. He believes that the constitution of the 
United States is a delegation of well-defined powers by the several states 
to the general government, the limits to which should under no circum- 
stances be transcended. 

In person. Colonel O. is below the medium stature, very well propor- 
tioned, and of nervous and sanguine temperament. He is urbane in his 
manners, kind and hospitable in his feelings, and dignified in his deport- 
ment — rather inclined to be taciturn in mixed assemblies, but among 
his friends and particular acquaintances he is animated in his conversa- 
tion, witty, interesting, and highly instructive. No man enjoys his 
friends with higher zest or greater cordiality, nor abides their fortunes, 
whether in prosperity or adversity, with greater cheerfulness and tena- 
city. To his clients, whilst practising his profession, he was at all times 
accessible, patient, and accommodating, in hearing the statements of 
their cases ; and if, in the trial of their causes, the result should prove 
unfavorable to their interests, they always left him. well satisfied that 
his best efforts had been employed in their behalf. 

Ck)lonel Overton has ever been charitable to the poor man, the widow 
and the orphan, cheerfully devoting his services to them, whenever called 
upon in a professional capacity, without fee or reward, as well as afford- 
ing them, in other respects, the free and liberal contributions of a bene- 
volent and generous neighbor and friend. His father reared and edu- 
cated ten children, six sons and four daughters. All his sons studied 
the law, but none of them practised this profession except Archibald W. 
and his eldest brother, Thomas J. Overton. All of them who were able 
to bear arms, except the subject of this notice, were active participants 
in the war of 1812. Thomas J. Overton, who commanded a company 
of infantry in the regiment commanded by Colonel Wells, of Kentucky, 



ARCHIBALD WALLER OVERTON, OF TENNESSEE. 573 

fell in the battle of the river Raisin, and Dr. James Overton, his third bro- 
ther, who acted as aid-de-camp to the commanding general, was taken pri- 
soner at the same time. His fourth brother, Samuel K. Overton, was 
commissioned by General Jackson to adjust the Spanish claims in the 
territory of Florida, who, after transacting the business for which he was 
commissioned, married, settled in Pensacola, and died there. John 
Waller Overton, his fifth brother, volunteered, and served a campaign 
in the Creek war as first lieutenant in Captain Walton's company of 
Colonel Allen's regiment, Tennessee volunteers. 

The sixth and last son is Dabney Carr Overton, a highly reputable 
farmer in the vicinity of Lexington, Kentucky, a gentleman of cultivated 
mind and great moral worth. Thus it will be seen that the subject ot 
this memoir is the oldest living member of his father's family. His 
mind is probably as clear, as active, and as vigorous at present as at 
any time during a long and eventful life. In fact the tenacity with 
which he retains both his mental and physical powers is truly remark- 
able. He makes no formal pretensions to religion, but regards the 
" Holy Scriptures" as the only reliable plan of salvation. He is emi- 
nently tolerant in his sentiments on the subject, and is hence a friend to 
all sects and denominations who conform to the doctrines of the Bible. 

He has been long and well known to the writer of this memoir, who 
has here to regret his inability to portray more fully the great excellence 
and distinguished merit of his friend, whom justly to appreciate in all 
relations, the foregoing synopsis of his life, taken from recollection, we 
are obliged to regard as greatly defective in material. To esteem him 
rightly in the whole circle of his character, it were needful to have en- 
joyed his personal acquaintance, for, by all allowance, his character can- 
not be given by any assemblage of mental or moral attributes drawn 
from the portraiture of ordinary men. From early life to his present 
age his individuality of character has ever been prominently remark- 
able, to be impersonated by few, if any, and to be known fully by those 
only by whom he is personally and intimately known. By such he will 
ever be recollected as a man of high intellectual endowments, moral 
worth, and professional eminence. 




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GEORGE W. NORTON, OF KENTUCKY. 575 



GEORGE W. NORTON, ESQ., 

OF RUSSKLLVILLE, KENTUCKY, PRESIDENT OF THE SOUTHERN BANK OF 

KENTUCKY. 

William Norton, the father of George "VV. Norton, removed from 
Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, to Russellville, Kentucky, in 1811, and is 
now one of the oldest residents of that town. In 1813, he raarried Miss 
Mary Hise, a lady distinguished for her intelligence, energy and prac- 
tical good sense. He is universally esteemed for probity and industry. 

George W., who is the oldest child, was born and educated in Rus^ 
sellville, and is now in his thirty -eighth year. In his fifteenth year, he went 
into a dry-goods store as a clerk ; by industry and attention to his du- 
ties gained the confidence and regard of his employers, and was enabled 
to begin business on his own account in his nineteenth year. He was 
actively and successfully engaged in commercial pursuits until the au- 
tumn of 1849, when he determined to retire from active employments 
until his naturally feeble constitution and usually feeble health could be 
somewhat restored. 

The charter of the Southern Bank of Kentucky, with a capital of two 
millions of dollars, having been amended by the recent legislature of 
his state, the friends of the institution, in the spring of 1850, determined 
to put it into operation at once. Upon the organization of the board of 
directors, at the very urgent solicitations of the stockholders and di- 
rectors, Mr. Norton was induced to accept the presidency of the bank. 
His success in commercial pursuits gave confidence to the community 
that the bank would be prudently and judiciously managed — expecta- 
tions which have not been disappointed. The Southern Bank of Ken- 
tucky has the confidence of the public to an extent not surpassed by 
any similar institution. 

In his intercourse with his fellow-men, he has endeavored to be influ- 
enced by strict integrity — as a consequence, he has the confidence and 
esteem of all who know him. 

At the age of about 18, he became a member of the Church, and has 
endeavored to live the life of a Christian. 

In 1847, he was married to Miss Martha Stewart Henry, daughter o\ 
the late Major M. W. Henry, of Kentucky. 




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JOHN W. NASH, OF VIRGINIA. 5'J'J 

HON. JOHN W. NASH, 

OF VIRGINIA. 

John W. Nash, the subject of the present memoir, is one of the 
judges of the General Court of Virginia, and the judge of the Second 
Judicial Circuit of that state. The Second Judicial Circuit comprises 
the city of Petersburg and seven of the adjoining counties, extending 
from the James River to the North Carolina border, and is inhabited 
by an enlightened and highly cultivated population. Judge Nash is by 
birth a Virginian, and a native of the county of Fauquier, and is of 
purely Virginian and English descent. He is no^v in the 59th year of 
his age, and resides in the county of Powhatan. His education, though 
classical, was not complete ; but this deficiency was in a great measure 
supplied by subsequent reading and study. He studied law in 1812 
and 1813, with John Love, Esq., a distinguished lawyer in the county of 
Prince William, and commenced his professional career in the county 
of Cumberland, on the south side of James River, in 1813. The United 
States was at that time engaged in the war with Great Britain, and Mr. 
Nash, who was then a very young man, with the characteristic ardor of 
men of his age, earnestly espoused the cause of the war, and gave to 
Mr, Madison's administration his hearty support. This necessarily 
placed him in opposition to that brilliant, but eccentric politician, the 
late John Randolph, of Roanoke, within whose congressional district he 
then resided ; and in the memorable contest of that day between the 
late John W. Eppes and Mr. Randolph, he gave to Mr. Eppes a cordial 
support. To this circumstance, perhaps, is to be attributed his early 
attention to politics: for in 1818 we find him returned as a delegate 
from the county of Cumberland to the legislature of the state ; and it 
was during the session of 1818 and 1819, that the statute laws of Vir- 
ginia (which had been previously revised and compiled by Mr. 
Leigh and others) were acted on by ihe legislature, and we find Mr. 
Nash one of the members of the committee in the House of Delegates 
to whom those bills were referred. He was thus afforded an opportunity 
of becoming still more familiar with the statute laws of the state, 
which were in after-life to engage so much of his attention. He served, 
however, only one session as a delegate from the county of Cumberland, 
but voluntarily resigned his seat for the purpose of devoting himself 
more exclusively to his profession. In 1820 he removed to the county 
of Amelia, where he united the pursuits of agriculture with the practice 
of the law, a thing not unusual with the country lawyers of Virginia 
and the other southern states. In 1825 he was elected, with the late 
Governor Giles, to represent the county of Amelia in the legislature, 
for the express purpose of opposing the call of a convention to alter the 
then constitution of Virginia, which, with the aid of others, they suc- 
ceeded in preventing at that time. He served for the next two sessions 
in the legislature, but again voluntarily resigned for the purpose of pur- 
suing his profession. It was during his residence in Amelia that he 
became involved in a discussion in the public papers with the late W^m, 
H. Eitzhugh, of Fairfax, in relation to the American Colonization 

37 



578 SKETCHES OF EMINE.SIV AMERICANS. 

Society, who was one of the Vice-Presidents of the Parent Society at 
Washington, and a most accomplished gentleman and elegant writer. 
Mr. Nash admitted the philanthropy in which the society originated, 
but with many others of that day, distrusted the success of the enterprise, 
and feared the influence which the indiscreet efforts of its advocates 
might produce upon the peace and tranquillity of a southern commu- 
nity. Mr. Fitzhugh was its unqualified advocate. Mr. Nash wrote 
under the signature of Caius Gracchus, and Mr. Fitzhugh under that of 
Opimius. Their controversy attracted much of the public attention at 
the time, and was subsequently republished by Ilalph Randolph Gur- 
ley, the resident agent of the parent society at Washington, in the 
African Repository, and again in pamphlet form. The publication 
may be referred to as furnishing specimens of Mr. Nash's style as a 
writer, and we refer to it only for that purpose ; for we have been in- 
formed that subsequently his opinions underwent much change upon the 
subject, and that he is at this time a sincere well-wisher of the colony 
in Liberia, and to the objects of the institution generally. In 1830 he 
sold out his plantation in Amelia, and removed to the county of Pow- 
hatan, the place of his present residence. He had not long been a resi- 
dent of Powhatan before he was again elected to the legislature, in the 
spring of 1832. He continued a member of the House of Delegates 
until the spring of 1835, when he was elected to the Senate of Virginia, 
of which body he continued a member for the next seven years. While 
a member of the Senate he was elected to preside over its deliberations, 
and acted as its speaker for the last three years of his service. Tn 1842 
he voluntarily resigned his office as speaker of the Senate, and member 
of that body, being heartily tired of public life, and the strife and tur- 
moil of party politics. 

The period which elapsed from 1832 to 1842, which embraced the 
last term of General Jackson's administration and that of Mr. Van Bu- 
ren, is known to have been one of deep interest and excitement in the 
political history of the country. In 1833, the State of South Carolina 
put forth an ordinance of Nullification, which drew from General Jack- 
son his famous Proclamation of that day, in which he denounced the 
proceedings of South Carolina as revolutionary in tndr character, and 
declared the determination of the Federal Government to execute its 
laws by force, if it should become necessary. This proclamation, and 
the Force Bill, which was passed by Congress by a large majority, 
although they had the efiect of putting an end to the heresy of Nullifica- 
tion, were regarded by many of the politicians of Virginia, and others, 
as erroneous in principle, and otherwise objectionable ; and being fol- 
lowed, in October, of the same year, by the removal of the United 
States deposits from the Bank of the United States, led to a serious 
division among the friends of the administration, and laid the founda- 
tion for the present division of the political parties of the country into 
Whigs and Democrats. Mr. Nash sided upon these questions with the 
administration. The doctrine which claims for a single state the power 
to declare a law of Congress void, and to prohibit its execution within 
her limits, at the same time that she remains a member of the Union, 
was too gross an absurdity ever to be admitted by him. He attached 
too high a value to the Union, and understood too well the principles of 
the Federal Constitution, to hesitate a moment in support of the principle 



JOHN W. NASH, OF VIRGINIA. 579 

of the Proclamation and the Force Bill, which affirmed the constitutional 
obligation of the President to execute the laws of Congress, although 
resistance thereto might be made under the authority of a state. The 
kindred doctrine, of the right of any state, at pleasure, peaceably to 
secede from the Union, finds no better favor with him than the doctrine 
of Nullification. He believes them to be revolutionary in their charac- 
ter, and belong to that class of moral and political rights, the exercise of 
which can only be justified when it is necessary to resist oppression by 
political revolution. Entertaining these opinions, and having been 
through life attached to the democratic party of the country, he gave to 
General Jackson's administration, and that of his successor, a cordial 
support. He is decided in his politics. But he was never, either in 
public or in private life, a bigoted, or intolerant partisan, and has often 
been heard to declare that he would as soon quarrel with his friend for 
the color of his hair, as he would fall out with him for any honest differ- 
ence of opinion upon the subject of politics. 

Hence it is that he numbers now, as he has always done, many of his 
warmest friends among those who differ with him upon party politics. 
And it is perhaps owing to this fact, and the high regard which he 
has for freedom and independence of opinion, on the part of others, 
that he was elected, on one occasion, speaker of the Senate, in a time of 
high party excitement, with a majority of political opponents in that 
body. 

In 1848. Judge Nash was appointed to his present office by the 
Governor of Virginia, which appointment was confirmed at the next ses- 
sion of the legislature, without opposition. Since he has been upon the *»'*■ 
bench, he has reviewed much of his early reading, and has discharged the 
duties of his office in a manner satisfactory to the public, and free from 
objection from any quarter. His circuit is one among the largest in the 
state, and perhaps there is none in the commonwealth in which a 
greater number of intricate legal and commercial questions are present- 
ed for discussion and decision. The members of the bar in his circuit 
are generally enlightened and well informed ; and many of them are 
among the tirst lawyers in the state. 

In his person, Judge Nash is rather below the middle stature ; and in 
early life was a little corpulent. In his manner he is courteous and re- 
spectful, but frank and decided. He has had much intercourse with his 
fellow-men, both as a politician and a man of business, and hence has 
acquired a large stock of practical information as well as a knowledge 
of human nature. His leading attributes of character however are his 
unbending love of justice, and his great devotion to truth, which he 
has been often heard to declare lay at the foundation of every other 
virtue. He has been thrice married, and is the parent of eight children, 
five sons and three daughters. His oldest son is a practising physi- 
cian ; his second son, is now engaged in merchandising in Mexico; his 
third, in the practice of the law ; and the two youngest, have not yet 
finished their education. His daughters reside with him. In his habits, 
he is temperate and industrious, and free from all ostentation, either in 
dress or manners. A utilitarian in principle, he always prefers that 
which is useful to that which is only ornamental. 



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BENJAMIN F. PERRY, OF SOUTH CAROLINA. 581 



BENJAMIN F. PERRY, 

OF GREENVILLE, SOUTH CAROLINA. 

The Honorable Benjamin Franklin Perry, a distinguished member 
tA' the South Carolina bar, and still more distinguished for the ability 
and firmness with which he resisted the late disunion movement in South 
Carolina, w»s born November the 20th, 1805, in the district of Pendle- 
ton, now Pickens, one of the mountain districts of South Carolina, 
and long the residence of Mr. Calhoun, and also the birthplace of 
Senator Rusk of Texas, General Waddy Thompson, Judge AVhitner, 
General Howard of Indiana, and Senator Adams of Mississippi. 

Benjamin Perry, the father of the subject of this memoir, was a 
native of Massachusetts. His ancestors were English. There were 
three brothers, who emigrated to America in the early settlement of 
Massachusetts. Two of them remained in the old Bay state, and the 
third moved to Rhode Island. From that brother has descended the 
family of Commodore Oliver II. Perry, At the early age of sixteen 
Benjamin Perry volunteered his services in the army of the Revolution_ 
and was in the attack on Rhode Island, in 1778, made by the com- 
bined forces of General Sullivan and Count D'Estaing, with the French 
fleet. Immediately after the close of the American Revolution, he 
entered a store in Boston as a clerk, where he remained till hi;? re- 
moval to Charleston. South Carolina, in 1784. Thence he came to 
Greenville, where he married Ann Foster, daughter of John Foster, 
of Virginia, who bore a lieutenant's commission in the army of 
the Revolution. Having purchased valuable lands on the Tugaloo, 
in Pendleton district, he quitted the mercantile business, and became an 
industrious cultivator of the earth. He lived to a very advanced age, 
and through his long life it is believed that no one ever attributed to 
him an intentional wrong. 

The mother of Benjamin F. Perry, like the mother of almost all dis- 
tinguished men, was a woman of great vigor of intellect and character. 
She possessed as warm a heart and as affectionate a disposition as ever 
fell to tlie lot of woman. Her memory is revered and cherished by 
her son with more than ordinary filial alfection. 

The childhood and youth of Benjamin F. Perry were spent amidst his 
native hills and mountains, alternately going to school and working on 
the farm, till he was sixteen years old. Uuring that period he mani- 
fested a great passion for books, and read everything h'e could lay his 
hands on, even to the American Encyclopedia, in ten or fifteen volumes. 
This early and strong manifestation for learning induced his uncle, 
Robert H. Foster, to advance him, as a loan, the requisite funds for 
his education and professional studies. He was accordingly sent, at 
the age of sixteen, to a classical school at Asheville, North Carolina, 
over which the Rev, Mr. Porter, a Presbyterian clergyman, presided. 
There he found David L. Swain, afterwards governor of North Caro- 



582 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

lina, and now president of Chapel Hill University, a pupil of Mr. 
Porter's, and was for some months his associate in the school, and 
boarded in the family of Dr. Swain, the governor's father. 

The Latin grammar was put into the hands of our student on Tuesday 
morning, and such was his intense application, comLined with remark- 
able facility of learning, that he memorized the whole of it before the 
coming Saturday evening. 

In 1824 ]Mr. Perry entered the law office of Judge Earle, and as he 
was then only eighteen years old he was enabled to furnish his mind 
with those rich stores of general information and literature wiiich have 
since enabled him to mingle, with the labors of a large professional 
practice, very many able articles to the periodical literature of the coun- 
try, lie varied his reading daily between law, history, poetry, novels 
and the drama. lie finished his course of legal study in the office of 
that eminent lawyer. Col. Gregg, of Columbia, and was admitted to the 
bar in 1827. In Columbia he had large opportunities of improvement 
in listening to the arguments in the courts of appeals, and the discus- 
sions in the legislature. It was at this time, that he was inspired with 
an ardent interest in politics, which he has never since lost. There 
was at that time an array of talent and eloquence in that body rarely 
equaled in any deliberative assembly. Judge Cheves was heard to say 
of that legislature, that there was not an equal number of able and 
eloquent men in the Congress of the United States. Judge O'Neall 
was the speaker of the house, and no where else have wc ever seen his 
equal as a presiding officer, and such men on the floor as Chancellor 
Harper, Senators Preston, Butler, Phett and Barnwell, Hugh S. Legare, 
Attorney General of the United States, Waddy Thompson, Minister to 
Mexico, Chimcellor Dunkin and Judges Wardlaw and Whitner. In 
the senate were Judge Smith, Governor Wilson, Governor Williams, 
Governor Miller and Thomas S. Grimke. 

In the law class in which Mr. Perry was admitted to the bar, there 
were fifteen applicants. How happy and joyous were they ! They had 
their commissions in their pockets, and thought they had nothing to do 
but to open an office and at once commence receiving fees, little 
dreaming of the trials and discouragements which lie in the way of the 
aspirant for professional eminence. At this moment Mr. Perry is the 
only one who still pursues the profession. He had more than the usu- 
ally severe probation of young lawyers, for besides that there was very 
little business, there was an unusual number of eminent members of 
the bar on the western circuit, of which Greenville, where he settled, 
formed a host. 

His first effort was in defence of a man indicted for the murder of his 
wife, at Pendleton court house. The case had excited some interest by the 
enormity of the ci-ime, and the ladies of the village came into the court- 
house to hear the argument of the counsel. But argument on the part 
of our young debutant, there was none. He rose so much embarrassed, 
we have heard him say. that there was not, when he looked the judge 
in the face, an idea in his head except a consciousness that the whole 
court, bidii's and all, were looking at him and expecting to hear him 
say something. After a few brief words, uttered in great confusion, ho 



BENJAMIN F. PERRY, OF SOUTH CAROLINA. 583 

sat down in great humiliation and distress. His proud spirit, irrepres- 
sible ambition, and a consciousness of talent, nevertheless sustained him, 
and enabled him to make another effort. He had great consolation 
and took new courage from the example of the great Sheridan. His 
next effort was at Greenville, the week after, and it was eminently suc- 
cessful. He was complimented by the judge and praised by the bar, 
and more than all, he acquitted a guilty client. It is generally a great 
mistake, although a common one, for young men to make their debut 
at the bar in a murder case. 

Mr. Perry has pursued the laborious study of his profession even 
more assiduously since than before his admission, and has realized, by 
a commanding practice, on the circuit which he rides, the rich rewards 
of emolument and reputation, to which talents of a high order, great 
labor and study, high personal character, and speaking talent of a high 
order, so well entitle him. It is the great glory of the profession that 
a spurious and fraudulent reputation canr>ot be maintained at it. His 
eminent success is all his own. He owes none of it to the adventitious 
circumstances of powerful friends or the arts of the pettifogger. 

In the exciting and memorable nullification contest of 1832, Mr. 
Perry took charge of the editorial department of a newspaper, then 
published in the town of Greenville, where he resided. Nearly all of 
his friends. Judge Earle, Warren R. Davis, General Thompson, and 
others, who would have been most likely to have influenced and con- 
verted his opinions, and would have converted those of almost any 
other so young a man, were all nullifiers. Most of the young men of 
the state were on the same side — as they are always apt to be — on the 
side that seems to be that of honor and patriotism, because, perhaps, it 
is the side of danger. But the opinions of Mr. Perry were fixed and 
undoubting in favor of the Union, the result of much reading and re- 
flection, not crude and hastily formed. The whole theory of nullifica^ 
tion, as set forth by Mr. Calhoun, in his various publications, was, in 
the judgment of Mr. Perry, at war w-ith the fundamental principles of 
our federal government, and impracticable in its operation. But it 
was a painful struggle for him to separate from cherished and honored 
friends, and from a large portion of the embodied chivalry and honor 
of the state. The crisis was one, however, which demanded the sacri- 
fice, and he made it ; and firmly and resolutely did he pursue the path 
of duty, as he regarded it, which is always the path of honor. "The 
Mountaineer" soon became a powerful and leading organ of the Union 
party, and all sorts of influences were used to bring over its bold and 
talented young editor. Appeals to old .and cherished friendships, to 
patriotism, courage, interest, and honor, to go with his state and 
friends, were all made, and made in vain. 

In the course of that angry and exciting struggle Mr. Perry became 
iuTolved in a duel with the editor of a nullification paper, published in 
the same town. His adversary was mortally wounded on the first 
fire. This, we have reason to know, has been the most painful circum- 
stance of Mr Perry's life, although he has nothing to reproach himself 
with in the circumstances which led to it. His adversary was com- 
paratively a stranger to him, and a young man of talent and promise. 



584 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

to whom he entertained nothing approaching a feeling of unkindness. 
But under the circumstances of the case, the temper of the times, and 
the prevalent feeling in South Carolina, there was no alternative. 

A convention of the Union party assembled in Columbia, August, 
1832, for the purpose of adopting measures to counteract the move- 
ment of the nullifiers. Mr. Perry was a delegate to that convention 
from Greenville, and his colleagues in that body were the venerable 
Revolutionary hero and patriot. Colonel Thomas Taylor, Judge Huger, 
Judge O'Neall, Chancellor Johnson, Poinsett, Petigru, Governor 
Manning, Judge Richardson, Governor Middleton, Judge King, and 
many others of the most distinguished names of the state. The op- 
position of the Union party at home, and the denunciations of President 
Jackson's proclamation, seemed only to madden almost to fury a 
gallant and already highly excited people. In the ensuing fall a 
regular convention of the people of the state was convened, by order 
of the legislature, in the capitol at Columbia. Mr. Perry was elected 
a member of this convention from Greenville, at the head of the 
ticket. His colleagues were Governor Middleton, Colonel Brockman, 
and Silas B. Whitten, Esq. 

This state convention met and nullified the tariff laws, adjourned 
till after the session of Congress, then re-assembled and repealed their 
ordinance of nullification. All this belongs to the general history of 
the country, and the limits of this article will not admit of that history 
being repeated. Although as ardent and uncalculating, whilst the con- 
flict raged, as any other individual on either side, now that he regarded 
the war as ended, both the great war with the federal government and 
the petit guerre amongst ourselves, Mr. Perry made a speech in the 
convention, urging an utter oblivion of past differences, and the resto- 
ration of an era of good feeling. He had opposed the action of the 
state, because he believed it would be futile, not that he favored the 
tariff system, or did not feel its injustice to the southern states. 

But in this effort at the restoration of harmony and good feeling in 
South Carolina, Mr. Perry was disappointed. The nullification party 
passed an oath of allegiance, which was aimed at the Union party, 
and calculated to exclude them from all offices, civil and military, in 
the state ! This oath of allegiance kept up party divisions for seve- 
ral years, was nullified by the court of appeals, modified and re-enacted 
by the legislature, and ultimately a compromise took place between 
the two parties. During this agitation there were frequent conventions, 
public meetings, and assemblages of each party in South Carolina. 
Mr. Perry was active and prominent on the Union side, and in 1834 
was put in nomination by that party, in the districts of Anderson, 
Pickens, and Greenville, for Congress. Six thousand votes were polled 
at the election, and he was beaten by a majority of only sixty, by that 
highly gifted and most popular man, the Hon. Warren R. Davis. Mr. 
Davis dying before he had entered upon his new term, Mr. Perry was 
again brought forward as a candidate, in opposition to General Thomp- 
son, and was again unsuccessful. General Thompson would, doubt- 
less, have been elected, under any circumstances, but his majority was 
much increased by the fact that Mr. Perry, being thrown from his 



BENJAMIN F. PERRY, OF SOUTH CAROLINA. 585 

carriage, and severely injured, was confined to his chamber till after 
the election. 

He now withdrew from politics, as he had long previously done 
from the editorial chair, and devoted himself exclusively to his pro- 
fession and general literature. Few lawyers in the state have enjoyed 
a larger practice, and none have exhibited more learning and ability, 
and been crowned with a more general success. The record of the life 
of an eminent lawyer would be little else than a book of reports, and 
unfit for such an article as this. Very soon after Mr. Perry's admis 
sion to the bar, he took a high position, and has been engaged in most 
of the important cases on his circuit, civil and criminal, and has well 
deserved and established his title to be ranked with the first lawyers of 
the state — able, learned, eloquent, firm, and just. 

We give the following interesting cases in which Mr. Perry was em- 
ployed, as a specimen of the character of his practice, which, we hope, 
will not be uninteresting to the professional reader ; and, as we are 
writing the life of a lawyer, it does seem proper to say something of 
the cases in which he was concerned. It would certainly be a strange 
anomaly to write the biography of a general who had been all his life 
in the field, and say nothing of the battles he fought ! But it would 
not do, however, to encumber his life with a minute detail of all his 
military orders, plans of action, and so forth. 

The trial of old Allen Twitty, for passing counterfeit money, was 
deeply interesting on many accounts. He had been for more than a 
half century at the head of a gang of counterfeiters, extending from Ca- 
nada to New-Orleans. He had been convicted in North Carolina, and 
banished the state. In Greenville he took up his abode, and was again 
indicted. The offence in South Carolina, at that time, was a capital one. 
Hence the extraordinary efforts made by this arch villain to escape 
conviction. Judge Wardlaw and Mr. Perry were his counsel. The 
state was represented by General Thompson. After a most laborious 
trial of several days, the prisoner was acquitted on the ground, taken by 
his counsel, that his confederate, who turned state's evidence, was not to 
be credited. So confident, however, was the presiding judge of his 
guilt, that he ordered him to be transferred to the Federal Court, and 
there prosecuted him for forgery on another bill on the bank of the 
United States. In the Federal Court, Twitty was defended by other 
counsel and convicted. He had been well known, in his younger days, to 
General Andrew Jackson, and was then a man of character and fortune. 
In consequence of this acquaintance, and moved by the extreme age and 
infirmity of the old man. President Jackson pardoned a portion of the 
imprisonment and set him at liberty. 

Tom Fiendly was tried for murder at Pickens court, and defended 
by the Hon. A. Burt and Mr. Perry. After the homicide, the defendent 
fled the country, and being in constant apprehension of arrest by some 
one, he thought it best to return, surrender himself to the law, and stand 
his trial ! Mr. Perry was sent for by Fiendly, and consulted as to the 
propriety of his surrendering himself, and advised strenuously against 
his taking such a step. "If you do," said Mr. Perry, "you will 
be convicted." Fiendly replied, " Be it so, but I am determined to 



686 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

Stand my trial !" When put upon his trial, he was anxious to take a 
juror whom Mr. Perry objected to. The prisoner said, "I know him 
well, and he is an intelligent, firm, conscientious man." " For that very 
reason, I object to him," said Mr. Perry. The trial resulted in an entire 
acquittal ! After it was over, the juror objected to, said to the counsel, 
" It Was well I was not of the panel, for 1 never would have consented 
to such a verdict." 

The trial of a distinguished gentleman in a neighboring state, who has 
since become known to the whole Union for his great ability and elo- 
quence in the Congress of the United States, was in every respect a 
most painful one to Mr. Perry. This gentleman had read law in his 
office, and was a great favorite with him. For his honor, spirit, friend- 
ship, high and pure character, Mr. Perry entertained the most sincere re- 
gard. In a moment of high excitement, and under deep provocation, 
he shot down in the street a gentleman of family, fortune and character, 
who died in a few hours ! The trial resulted in a verdict of man- 
slaughter. Great efforts were made on the part of the state, and addi- 
tional counsel employed by the family of the deceased. The defence 
was conducted by Judge Wardlaw, the Hon. A Burt and Mr. Perry, 
and never did gentlemen exert themselves more in any case. 

Miss Wells, a northern school-mistress, who came to Greenville 
highly recommended, and was highly connected at the north, was tried 
for infanticide, and defended by Mr, Perry alone. The case was an ex- 
traordinary one. No one had suspected the defendant of any impro- 
priety until the child was discovered concealed in a basket, the umbilical 
cord being around its neck. A most respectable family were present 
and around the bed during her confinement ! The speech made by Mr. 
Perry in defence of Miss Wells gained him some praise and a verdict 
of not guilty. 

One or two years after this unfortunate circumstance, Mr. Perry was 
called upon to defend a brother of Miss Wells, for shooting down in 
the streets her seducer with a double-barrel gun ! It was cool and de- 
liberate, and done without any warning to the deceased. The trial re- 
sulted in a verdict of guilty, and the defendant was pardoned by Gover- 
nor Aiken. 

Some years since, Mr. Perry had a case on the issue docket at 
Spartanburgh, and had summoned an old man to prove a deed on which 
the case depended. Whilst attending court he killed two of his room- 
mates, and came very near killing a third, with a little pocket-knife ! 
His companions had been bedeviling the old man a great deal. When 
put on his trial, Mr. Periy was retained with Colonel Seitner to defend 
him. His defence was conducted with all the power and ability which 
his counsel possessed, but the jury returned a verdict of guilty. They 
had no notion of seeing a man acquitted who had killed two of his com- 
panions in one frolic ! But the governor took a more compassionate 
view of the matter and pardoned him. The old man, after his pardon, 
was sworn as a witness in court, and on his testimony Mr. Perry gained 
his lawsuit. 

Recently, Mr. Perry was employed on the part of the state, for the 
first time, in a case of murder. Judge Butler, now one of the senators 
in Congress, from South Carolina, was called from Washington to de- 



BENJAMIN F. PERRY, OF SOUTH CAROLINA. 587 

fend the accused, and Mr. Perry was sent for, out of his circuit, to pro- 
secute. The prisoner and the deceased had been fiiends, and were both 
young men of fortune and great respectability. The trial was one of 
extraordinary interest, and the ladies of the village of Newberry came in 
to hear the arguments, and sat from morning till night without going 
to dinner ! The jury, after being out all night, retui-ucd a verdict of 
not guilty. The speech of Mr. Perry is spoken of by all as one of 
unusual ability and eloquence. This is high praise, when it is remem- 
bered that Senator Butler was engaged in the same case, and made a 
speech of unusual power and eloquence even for him. 

On the civil side of the court, ]\Ir. Perry has, likewise, had a fine 
practice in the districts of Greenville, Anderson, Pickens, Spartanburgh 
and Laurens. lie has assisted in the Court of Appeals, in law and equi- 
ty, and in the Court of Errors, composed of both the chancellors and 
law judges, in the settlement of some higlily important principles. The 
case, William J. Alston and others, vs. W. Thompson, 1 Chev. 271, 
involved the question, whether a deed in South Carolina was valid to 
convey lands without witnesses. This case went to the court of eiTors, 
and M'as decided against the validity of the deed ! Mr. Petigru and 
Mr. Perry were in favor of the deed, and both still think the decision 
of the court wrong. Judge O'Neall, one of the members of the court, 
declared a dissenting opiniun. and adopted the written argument of Mr. 
Perry as a part of his ojiinion. 

The case of Vardry jNIcBec ads. Ilenning's creditors, went to the 
court of errors, on the question, whether a deed of conveyance fur land 
in South Carolina was valid against the judgment creditors, without 
being recorded. This was a case of great interest and involved a 
large amount. A majority of the court decided in favor of the deed 
without recording. !^Ir. Perry was for the deed, and wrote out his ar- 
gument at great length, with all his authorities. 

The case of !McBee and others vs. Hoke, was decided in the Law 
Court of Appeals after elaborate argument. This case involved the 
question whether the acts of a coroner, appointed by the legislature, 
but who had not qualified, or given bonds, as I'equired by law, were 
valid and binding or not. Mv. Perry was for the afHrmative, and the 
court sustained him. 

The most novel case, however, in which Mr. Perry ever had any- 
thing to do, was in reference to the executors of Mrs. May root's will 
being appointed by implication. Pie lost both sides of this case, and 
finally established the opinion he had first given in the case ! He said 
there was an appointment by implication. The Court of Appeals 
decided against him. He then filed a bill in equity to carry out 
the opinion of the Court of Appeals, and the Court of Errors reversed 
the opinion of the Court of Appeals and dismissed his bill ! 

In the Court of Equity we will mention one case, in which ■Sir. Perry 
filed a bill for an old man, to set aside his marriage with a woman of 
bad character, on the ground that he was not in his proper mind when 
the marriage took place. Ally Mattison, the complainant, had been 
drinking till he was under mania a potu, and conceived the idea, that 
the Almighty had commanded him to marry the defendant, or he 
should die in three davs ! The chancellor dismissed the bill f^r want 



688 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

of jurisdiction, and it went to the Court of Appeal in Chancery, 
and thence to the Court of Errors. Mr. Perry and General Thon)pson 
argued the case at great length in the Court of Errors, but the decree of 
the chancellor was affirmed. The court held that they had no right to 
dissolve a marriage contract for fraud or want of capacity, unless it came 
up on some collateral issue ! How this can be, Mr. Perry confesses he 
cannot perceive. In South Carolina the marriage contract is entirely 
a civil contract, and as such ought to be set aside, like all other con- 
tracts, on account of fraud or incompetency to make it. 

In the fall of 1836 Mr. Perry was elected a member of the state 
legislature without opposition. A good many Union members were 
returned from Charleston, and other districts throughout the state. At the 
instance of Mr. Perry, they united witli him in electing Judge "Wardlaw 
speaker of the House of Representatives. In the formation of the com- 
mittees, Mr. P. was placed on the judiciary and the committee of federal 
relations ; James L. Petigru, Esq., one of the ablest and most accom- 
plished lawyers in the United States, was chairman of the judiciary com- 
mittee, and David L. McCord, an able and old member of the house, 
was at the head of the committee on federal relations. The subject of 
slavery came up before Mr. McCord's committee, on several occasions, 
by messages raid other documents, sent by the northern states, but it was 
then thought best in South Carolina not to agitate the question. The 
annexation of Texas to the United States was brought before the legis- 
lature by Governor McDuffie, in a message strongly denouncinrr that 
measure. Mr. Perry made a speech eminently successful on this 
question, which elicited from LIr. Petigru a very high complimxcnt 
— "laudare a laudato."' Whilst 'Mr. Perry most cordially sympathized 
with the Tcxans in their struggle for independence, he did not think it in 
good faith for the United States to extend their government over them. 
Nor was he satisfied as to the policy of extending the boundaries of the 
republic. This, too, was the ojiinioii expressed about that time by 
Governor Hayne in conversation with Mr. Perry, and of which conver- 
sation he has a full note in his journal. The Louisville and Cincinnati 
llail-road came before the legislature this session, and Mr. Perrv was 
its warm advocate and defender. In order to save the. road and 
charter, through the limits of South Carolina, it became necessary 
for the legislature to make heavy loans and subscriptions of stock. 
These measures were als(j voted for by !Mr. Perry, and the success of 
the road, together with the present price of the stock, proves the wis- 
dom of the measure. 

In 1838 Mr. Perry was re-elected to the legislature, and in con 
sequence of his attention to the correctness of all claims and appropri- 
ations made bj' the legislature, he was placed at the head of the com- 
mittee on claims, and in that position saved the state many thousands 
of dollars by his thorough and searching investigation of all matters 
presented to the house. In all the active business of the legislature, 
and in all of the discussions of the house, Mr. Perry took a decided and 
prominent part. He brought forward, whilst a member of the house, 
various measures of reform and improvement in our laws and state 
government. 



BENJAMIN F. PERRY, OF SOUTH CAROLINA. 589 

The establishment of a penitentiary system in South Carolina was 
one of these measures. He was appointed chairman of a special com- 
mittee on this subject, to collect information and report the same to the 
legislature. This task he performed with great care and labor. He 
opened a correspondence with the agents and keepers of several of the 
northern penitentiaries. He obtained from the clerks of the courts 
throughout the state a vast deal of statistical information, in regard to 
the various convictions and prosecutions in their courts. He was the 
means of obtaining from Dr. Lieber, of the South Carolina College, a 
valuable pamphlet on the penitentiary system, which was widely dis- 
tributed over the state. The report of Mr. Perry included a great deal 
of information, but it met with no favor from the legislature. Accom- 
panying the report he likewise submitted a code of laws compiled 
by himself, adapted to the penitentiary punishment. In his report and 
speech before the legislature, Mr. Perry endeavored to show that 
the object of punishment was not revenge, but the reformation of the 
criminal, and the protection of society against future crimes. 

The tenure of the office of judge Mr. Perry thought should be limited 
to the age of seventy. He introduced a bill to alter the constitution in 
that respect, which at one session passed both houses by a constitutional 
majority, but was defeated at the session of a new legislature. Mr. 
Perry was in favor of blending the courts of law and equity, so as to 
have the same judge preside in both courts, but to keep the jurisdictions 
separate and distinct. He was opposed to all connection between bank 
and state, and in concert with Col. Memminger he advocated the wind- 
ing up of the state bank. He was in favor of giving the election 
of electors of President and Vice-President to the people in South 
Carolina, as was the case in all the other states of the Union. He was 
also in favor of giving the election of governor to the people, and 
equalizing the basis of representation between the upper and lower 
country. 

In 1844, Mr. Perry was elected to a seat in the State Senate from 
the district of Greenville. He was there placed at the head of the com- 
mittee on finance and banks, and during the four years he continued 
in the Senate, no member of that body took a more active and promi- 
nent part in all of its proceedings and debates. He was in the Senate 
when Mr. Hoar was sent by Massachusetts to South Carolina, He was 
the only member of the Senate who voted against the expulsion of that 
gentleman from the state. This he did, because, in his opinion, it was 
contrary to both the state and federal constitutions. Although in a mi- 
nority of one, he said this carried no terrors to his mind whilst discharg- 
ing a duty to himself and his country. There was only one member of 
the house, Colonel Memminger, who had the boldness to vote against 
this expulsion, without trial by jury, as the constitution guarantees. 
It was, too, on the part of the legislature, an usurpation of judicial 
power. 

South Carolina has been, for the last twenty-five years, a disunion 
state, and Mr. Perry has been consistently a Union man ever since he 
entered public life. He is, therefore, in a lean minority, which has ef- 
fectually excluded him from all state honors and offices. But he has 



690 ^ SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

never aspired to any before the legislature. He has been voted for, 
once or twice, for chancellor, and president of the state bank. When 
General Cass was a candidate for the Presidency, Mr. Perry, who was 
not then in the legislature, was elected, by the legislature, an elector to 
represent the state at large in that election. This honor was conferred 
on him in consequence of his defeat for Congress the same fall, on ac- 
count of his preference for General Cass over General Taylor. The 
whigs all sustained, with a few exceptions, his opponent. Colonel Orr, 
in consequence of his going for General Taylor ; and being a democrat, 
Colonel Orr divided that party with Mr. Perry. 

Whilst he has thus been proscribed from the honors of the state, he 
has never, directly or indirectly, sought office or favor from the federal 
government — a rare instance, in these times, of self-sacrifice and abne- 
•gation. Some gentlemen talk on this subject as if there was no such 
thing as venality and office-seeking except with those who seek federal 
office. They forget that there are many more, and much more desirable 
offices, within the reach of South Carolinians, from South Carolina, than 
from the federal government. It is not impossible that the political 
course of some gentlemen may be directed by a secret wish (perhaps 
unconscious influence of the fascination) of a seat on the bench, in the Se- 
nate, or the gubernatorial chair. But surely no one will impute selfish 
motives or personal ambition to one like Mr. Perry, self-restrained from 
the honors and offices of the state, who has never, in any manner, 
sought either from the federal government. 

Mr. Perry has, in the course of his life, made a good many public 
speeches, and has been frequently called on to deliver addresses before 
literary societies and schools. Like all young men preparing for the 
bar, he was selected, whilst a student, to deliver an oration on the fourth 
of July, which was well received. After his admission to the bar, he 
was forced to make another address, on the anniversary of American In- 
dependence, to the citizens of Greenville. Whilst a member of the 
legislature, he delivered an address before the several literary socie- 
ties. During the political excitement in 1833, he was called on to 
deliver an address, on the anniversary of the battle of the Cow- 
pens, on the battle-field. Whilst canvassing for Congress, he de- 
livered an address before the female seminary at the Limestone 
Springs. 

Mr. Perry has occasionally written for the Southern Review and 
other periodical and literary journals. He reviewed, at some length, 
the Lives of the Lord Chancellors, by Lord Campbell, in the Southern 
Quarterly. He also wrote for this journal an article on the Revolu- 
tionary history of South Carolina, and one in favor of giving the election 
of electors of President and Vice-president to the people. In the Mag- 
nolia, he wrote a variety of articles embodying the Revolutionary inci- 
dents of the upper part of South Carolina, which were republished in a 
great many of the southern papers. 

For the last twenty years Mr. Perry has kept a journal of his life, 
in which he has recorded not only the incidents connected with himself, 
but the conversations he has had with others, after the fashion of Bos- 
well's Life of Johnson. He has also drawn sketches of many of the 
prominent men of South Carolina, which will one day be of some in- 



BENJAMIN F. PERRY, OF SOUTH CAROLINA. 591 

terest to the public. For thirty years past, too, he has kept a minute 
and correct account of all the money received by him, and for what re 
ceived, as well as an account of all the moneys he has spent, and how 
they were spent. He has also kept a file of every letter that he has re- 
ceived, and has had several volumes bound. 

In the investigation of cases for court, Mr. Perry has made it a rule 
to preserve all his notes of authorities and arguments. This he has found 
of assistance when similar cases came before him again. In some im- 
portant cases he has written out the whole arguments. Whilst profess- 
ing to be a thorough democrat in politics, Mr. Perry alleges that he is 
a conservative in everything. He thinks our system of government the 
wisest that can be formed, and he therefore tries to preserve it. He 
wishes in the same way to preserve everything that is good, or may 
be useful hereafter. Even his newspapers, pamphlets, and reviews, are 
all preserved and bound. He has several hundred volumes of this 
character now in his library, bound by his directions. 

In all the public improvements of the country Mr. Perry has taken 
an active part, and contributed most liberally in proportion to his 
means. The Greenville and Columbia Rail-road, the greatest enter- 
prise ever undertaken in the upper part of South Carolina, owes its 
origin, in a great measure, to him. The road was suggested by another; 
but Mr. Perry brought the public mind to bear on it and undertake it. 
His friend, Judge O'Neall, has the honor of carrying out the enterprise. 

In 1850 the secession and disunion feeling rose so high in South Caro- 
lina, that it was said the state was a unit in favor of breaking up the 
government and forming a new confedei-acy. Mr. Perry, however, re- 
mained "faithful amidst the faithless," and boldly proclaimed hife oppo- 
sition to secession and disunion as destructive of liberty and the very 
inatitutions of the South, for the preservation of which the Union was 
to be dissolved. The secession party wished to make a demonstration 
in Greenville, and invited Colonel Memminger to a public meeting. 
Every yree voter in the district was present, and they made such a hurra 
in opposition to General Thompson and Mr. Perry, that the news went 
abroad Greenville had gone for secession, and Perry was put down, 
never to rise again. His friends lamented his fate, and his enemies 
were in ecstasy at his downfall in a district which had ever stood by 
him through good report and through evil report. Mr. Perry, how- 
ever, was not at all alarmed. He everywhere declared that Greenville 
was still true to her ancient faith, and adhered to the Union, although 
ready to defend her rights when they were invaded. He, moreover, 
said that he had no fears of the state, and that this whole matter would 
end in a big fuss — nothing more — as nullification had done. 

In the early part of the fall of 1850, Mr. Perry suggested the pro- 
priety of establishing a Union paper, at Greenville, as a rallying point 
for the dismembered and broken party throughout the state. He thought 
it would be a nucleus for them to form on, and ultimately save the state 
from revolution and disunion. At that time there was not a newspaper 
in South Carolina or a public man who dared express any opposition to 
the action of the state. Such opposition was branded as treason, and 
the opposers as traitors. This, however, did not, in the least, deter Mr. 
Perry from his project of establishing a Union paper, and letting the 



592 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

honest and thinking people hear both sides of the question. Some of 
his personal friends came to him and said, that if he persevered in estab- 
lishing his newspaper, his property would be destroyed, and his life en- 
dangered. His reply deserves being repeated. He said : " I will go on 
with the paper if it sinks every cent of property I have in the world, and 
sacrifices my life in its defence." 

The crowning glory of Mr. P.'s life is the more than Roman courage 
with which he took this position in the late exciting and dangerous crisis 
in South Carolina. No one who resides out of the state can adequately 
appreciate the terrific excitement of the people at that most dangerous, 
crisis. It was literally true that " the boldest held their breath for a 
time." Men who had never quailed before, were afraid to express one 
sentiment of affection for the Union given us by our fathers, or wish for 
its continuance on any terms ! It was a curse per se, and abolendus est 
was the watch-word, and knave, traitor and coward was he who did not 
echo that war-cry ! It was under such circumstances of danger, of 
odium, of self sacrifice, that he willingly and fearlessly assumed the 
editorship of the " Southern Patriot." The difficult and dangerous path 
which was before, he trod with courage, patriotism, wisdom and a high 
courtesy, which have won the respect and admiration of even his op- 
ponents. 

The legislature met in November, and Mr. Perry was a member. 
Two of his colleagues, Col. Buchanan and Mr. Dean, and himself^ were 
the only avowed Union men in that assembly ! When the question of 
federal relations was discussed in the house, Mr. Perry opposed the 
action of the state, in a speech of great length, and boldly assured his 
persecutors that the Union was a blessing and not a curse ; and 
that slavery was protected by it, and we had no cause to break up 
the government, on account of the compromise which had just passed 
Congress, and which was acceptable to all the southern states except 
South Carolina. After concluding his speech, Mr. Perry said to a friend : 
" I intend that my argument to-day shall be published to the world, and 
will leave it as a legacy to my country and my children. They will, 
at some future day, appreciate the truths it contains, although this 
house now spurns and contemns them." The speech was published, and 
has been republished throughout the southern states. Ten thousand 
copies of it were struck off in Charleston, at the expense of two or 
three gentlemen, for distribution in South Carolina and Georgia. It 
was hailed at Washington and New-Orleans as a ray of light from 
South Carolina, and was certainly the first cheek which secession and 
disunion received in the state. 

The election for members of the state convention to dissolve 
the Union took place in February, 1851. The speech of Mr. Perry had 
been published in the Carolinian, and was sent throughout the state just 
preceding the election. In Greenville it was widely circulated, and had 
its influence. The Union party of that district were, however, disunited. 
They remembered the Memminger meeting, and looked upon themselves 
as standing alone, against the whole state, and the newspapers said, the 
whole South. They were unwilling, therefore, to show fight in the 
election of members to the convention, and thought they would be de- 
feated. Mr. Perry replied, that after defeat, it would be time enough 



BKNJAMIN F. PERRT, OF 80UTH CAROLINA. 593 

to think of surrendering ; but that surely they should not think of this, 
as brave cavaliers, on the eve of battle. The election in Granville re- 
sulted in favor of the Union ticket three to one ! In other portions of 
the state the people kept away from the polls, and only a few fire-eaters 
voted. In Charleston, where they can poll three thousand votes, as 
many hundred elected ! In Pendleton district, where the vote is five 
or six thousand, four or five hundred elected ! 

The Southern Patriot was first issued immediately after the election, 
and Messrs. Perry and Eiford became its editors. It was everywhere 
denounced by the newspapers in South Carolina, but its subscription 
list immediately became the largest of anv country paper in the state. 
It had the precise eficct predicted by Mr. Perry, and immediately 
a change came over the state. Secession was abandoned, and co-opera- 
tion substituted in its place. This, too, has died away, and the state 
is now quiet, and at peace once more with herself and the federal 
government. The state has been saved, and the Union preserved. 

In the summer of 1846, Mr. Perry, in company with his friends, 
Colonel Fair and Mr. Moore, made the tour of the northern states, and 
went down the St. Lawrence to Montreal and Quebec. The Hon. 
Joel R. Poinsett, who then resided near Greenville, and with whom Mr. 
Perry was on terms of great friendship and intimacy, took great pains 
to make his travels interesting, by giving him letters to a great many 
of the distinguished men at Washington, and throughout the northern 
states. Congress was in session, and Mr. Perry had this opportunity 
of seeing the assembled wisdom and greatness of the American Re- 
public. He was very much disappointed in the appearance of the 
members of the House of Representatives. He thought they were in- 
ferior looking men, and their deportment and debates did not impress 
him favorably. On, entering the Senate chamber, and looking at the 
members, he was more struck with the appearance of Colonel Benton 
than that of any other senator. Mr. Archer, of Virginia, kindly pro- 
posed to him to name any of the senators who attracted his attention. 
He was greatly disappointed in the personal appearance of Mr. Critten- 
den of Kentucky. The high bearing, talents, eloquence, and high sense 
of honor which had characterized Mr. Crittenden's public career, had 
induced Mr. Perry to believe that he was a tall, fine-looking, and 
polished gentleman. This idea of Mr. Crittenden's appearance was 
not realized in the diminutive person, homely features, and plain 
manners of the gentleman before him. "When he afterwards met him 
at Senator Archer's, and saw him pull off his coat, and take a seat at the 
whist table with Mr. Bodisco, the Russian minister, and some other 
gentlemen, his beau ideal was gone. 

Through the kindness of General Thompson, Mr. Perry was invited 
one Sunday evening to see Mr. Webster at his own house, in Wash- 
ington. He found the defender of the constitution sitting in his portico, 
in his shirt sleeves, and looking like some old farmer who was waiting 
for Monday, to gear up his horse and go to plowing again. Mr, 
Webster ordered some refreshments, and immediately commenced the 
most interesting and brilliant conversation to which Mr. Perry had 
ever listened. 

On his route from Albany to Boston Mr. Perry stopped at Kinder 

38 



S94 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

hook, to see Mr. Van Buren. He was very much pleased with him. 
The New-York convention was in session, and Mr. Perry was greatly 
surprised to hear Mr. Van Buren express himself in favor of electing 
all the judges by the people. He had formerly been of a different 
opinion, and was then shocked to hear Mr. Jefferson express the views 
which he now entertained. 

In Albany, Mr. Perry had the pleasure of seeing Governor Wright 
and Mr. Governeur Kemble, with both of whom he was very much 
pleased. He thought Mr. Poinsett's opinion of Governor Wright was 
true, that he possessed the fairest mind in argument and the clearest 
one in explaining his views that he had ever encountered in life. 

Mr. Polk was at this time President of the United States, and Mr. 
Perry was a strong supporter of his administration. He now thinks 
it is perhaps the most brilliant and the best the country has ever had. 
But the personal appearance and manners of Mr. Polk did not strike 
him as being anything extraordinary. The manners and appearance of 
Mrs. Polk made a different impression on his mind. He thought her 
the most interesting and charming woman that he had seen in his 
travels. 

Mr. Perry was most favorably impressed with the appearance of Bos- 
ton and its inhabitants. He thought the citizens generally the finest- 
looking that he had anywhere seen. He visited Mr. Everett, who was 
the president of Harvard College, and found him a most pleasant and 
agreeable gentleman. He took a stroll over the college buildings, and 
spent some time in the library. The collection of books did not seem 
so large as he had expected to see. 

In Philadelphia, Mr. Perry searched out the houses in which William 
Penn and Dr. Franklin had once resided. They were very humble 
buildings, and that of Dr. Franklin's had been appropriated to a grocery. 
This he looked upon as almost sacrilegious. 

Mr. Perry has always taken an interest in agriculture, the occupation 
of his youth. He has made several agricultural addresses, which have 
been published and republished in several of the papers of the state. 
He made one before the Farmers' Society of Pendleton, at their anni- 
versary celebration. Mr. Calhoun was present, and expressed himself 
much gratified by the address. But Mr. Perry's chief occupation has 
been with his books. 

The State Convention of South Carolina, elected for the purpose of 
•dissolving the Union, assembled in April last. Mr. Perry was a mem- 
ber of this convention, as has been already stated. In the formation of 
the committee of twenty-one, which consisted of the ablest members of 
the convention, including several judges, chancellors, senators, ex-gover- 
nors, and members of Congress, Mr. Perry was placed on this commit- 
tee, and was the only member of it who spoke and voted against the 
constitutional right of a state to secede from the Federal Union. He 
said that secession was a revolutionary right, paramount to all constitu- 
tions, political compacts, or agreements — the right of a brave people "to 
alter or abolish" their government, when it becomes destructive of the 
ends for which it was instituted, and ceases to protect them in the en- 
joyment of their " lives, liberty, and pursuit of happiness ;" but that it 
was deceiving the people to tell them it was a constitutional right. For 



BENJAMIN F. PERRY, OF SOUTH CAROLINA. 595 

himself he preferred calling things by their right nannes. The people of 
South Carolina ought to know that it is a right which they will have to 
fight for. When that evil day does come which is to terminate this Fe- 
deral Union, he preferred appealing directly to the sword rather than 
searching charters and constitutions for a right which he knew the other 
parties to the compact would deny. He admired the English baron who, 
when called on by his sovereign to produce the titles to his estate, threw 
down upon the table his sword, and said, "This is the title by which my an- 
cestors have held these lands, and it is the one by which I now claim 
them." 

Mr. Perry denied that we had any just cause for breaking up the 
Union and resorting to revolution. He admitted that great wrongs and 
injustice had been done the South, but that it would not do to break up 
a government every time it went wrong. He had regarded the union 
of the states, in the language of the father of his country, as the " pal- 
ladium of our independence," " tranquillity," "peace," "safety," "pros- 
perity," and " liberty." It was, therefore, right and proper, honorable 
and patriotic, that we should " suffer while evils were sufferable, rather 
than right ourselves by abolishing the forms to which we have been ac- 
customed." He contended that African slavery was moral and correct, 
and a great blessing to the slave himself; that it was absolutely neces- 
sary to the peace and prosperity of the southern states, and should be 
forever defended and maintained by them at any and all hazards, and to 
the last extremity of their existence as a people. 

Mr. Perry said, in the report which he submitted to the convention on 
the part of himself, as a member of the committee of twentj'-one, that 
the union of the several states of this confederacy was formed for the 
purpose of protecting equally the interests of all the states, their do- 
mestic institutions, property, and industrial pursuits; and the existence 
of African slavery in the southern states at the formation of the Federal 
Union, was not only recognized in the constitution, but guaranteed, and 
made the basis, in fact, of their representation in the Congress of the 
United States. He also stated that it would be good cause for South 
Carolina to resist, in company with the other southern states, or alone, 
if need be, by all the means which Nature and God have given her any 
and every attempt on the part of Congress to interfere with slavery in 
the states, or the slave-trade between the states, or to abolish slavery in 
the district of Columbia, without the consent of the ovoiers, or to exclude 
slavery from the southern territories of the United States, or the forts 
and navy-yards in the slave-holding states, or refuse the admission of a 
state into the Union on account of slavery, or refuse to carry out the ex- 
isting constitutional provisions on the subject of the rendition of fugitive 
slaves, or alter or change the federal constitution in any respect touch- 
ing slavery. 

The report submitted by Mr. Perry met the approval of a large num- 
ber of the moderate-thinking men throughout the state. Even Barnwell 
Rhett, the arch secessionist of Carolina, said to Mr. Perry that his re- 
port had put to the blush both secessionists and co-operationists, and 
that Mr. Barnwell, the leader of the co-operation party, had, too, admits 
ted the same thing, and it was, in some respects, preferable to the re- 
port adopted by the convention. 



596 SKETCHES or EMINENT AMERICANS. 

Mr. Perry is a member of the board of trustees of the South Carolina 
College, which board is elected by the legislature every four years ; and 
ne takes a deep interest in the prosperity and reputation of the college. 
On many occasions, in the Senate and House of Representatives, he has 
defended the college when assailed by senators and members. Several 
of the professors are his warm personal and political friends. Two years 
ago, on a visit to Columbia, one of them called on him at his lodgings 
to lament the approaching end of the Union. Mr. Perry laughed at the 
apprehensions of the learned professor, and said that, so far from seced- 
ing, South Carolina would be, in ten years, the most thorough-going 
Union state in the Republic. After the adjournment of the convention, 
this professor reminded Mr. Perry of what he had said, and that a por- 
tion of it was now true. " Yes," said Mr. Perry, " and the other por- 
tion will be true. I shall have to defend the states-rights doctrines of 
Virginia, in a few years, against the consolidation principles of South 
Carolina !" 

In 1837, Mr. Perry was married in the city of Charleston to Miss 
Elizabeth Frances McCall, daughter of Robert McCall, Esq., a niece oi 
General Robert Y. Hayne, a lovely and accomplished woman. He has 
five children, three sons and two daughters. Mr. Perry has always 
lived like a gentleman, in a style happily combining elegance and fru- 
gality, only extravagant in the purchase of books. He has saved a com- 
petency, and has a handsome income from his profession. His person 
is tall and commanding, with a face more than ordinarily intellectual. 
His manners are at the same time grave, cordial and refined. His 
nature is frank, confiding, generous, impulsive and quick — more 
quick to forgive and forget than to take oflTence. In all the domestic 
relations of life he is without fault and without blemish. As a lawyer, 
able and learned. In public affairs, as firm as Cato, and as just as 
Aristides. 




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NATHANIEL RIDLEY EAVES, OF SOUTH CAROLINA. 597 



HON. NATHANIEL RIDLEY EAVES, 

OF SOUTH CAROLINA. 

The honorable Nathaniel Ridley Eaves was born in the State of 
Virginia, in the town of Bellfield, on the Meherrin River. His mother 
died when he was but five days old, leaving three sons and a daughter. 
His father was a native of Greenville county, Va,, and served in the Re- 
volutionary war, at the close of which, being then quite young, he was 
stationed at Nansemond River, where he became acquainted with the 
mother of Mr. Eaves, and, after the war terminated, married her. She 
was a Holiday, and her ancestors were among the first permanent set- 
tlers in Nansemond county. Mr. Eaves' father, shortly after the death 
of his wife, removed to the State of South Carolina, and settled in 
Chester District, on the Catawba River. 

Mr. Eaves received most of his academical education at Mt. Bethel 
Academy, in Newberry District, after which he entered the South Caro- 
lina College, and graduated in the year 1815. He was always greatly 
attached to his alma mater, and in his subsequent senatorial career was 
devoted to its interests and prosperity, being usually a member of the 
standing committee, whose more special duty it was to superintend the 
concerns of the college, education, and religion. 

After receiving his degree of bachelor of arts, he entered, as a law 
student, the ofiice of the late Colonel Joseph Gist, of Union District, one 
of the most eminent and successful practitioners at the bar in the up- 
country of South Carolina. In the spring of 1819, Mr. Eaves, having 
received his license, commenced the practice of the law at Chester 
Ccurt-house ; and so great was the esteem in which he was held by his 
late instructor, that the latter, having proposed terms, entered into a co- 
partnership with him in the practice of his profession. 

The father of Mr. Eaves was possessed of but a small estate. His 
children were justly entitled to a handsome property in right of their 
mother ; but being on his way to Virginia to claim it in their behalf, 
he was taken sick, and died ; and during the long minority which fol- 
lowed, there being no person to represent and prosecute the claim, the 
property was dissipated. ^^-v^ ': .-.ve 

Mr. Eaves, as a lawyer, is not so remarkable for the quickness with 
which he arrives at his conclusions, as for their certainty, and for the 
caution with which he expresses a legal opinion. If he is not always 
prepared to solve an intricate query, he reserves his judgment until, 
by a patient examination of authorities, his mind is fully made up on 
the subject, and he then gives his reply without hesitation. He has 
thus acquired the confidence of his clients in the correctness of his judg- 
ment on all occasions. As a speaker at the bar, as well as in the 
Senate chamber, his style is rather discursive, but he always succeeds 
in presenting the strong points of his case with a force that produces 
conviction, sometimes indulging in witticisms and original remarks at 
the expense of an opponent, which are a source of amusement to the 



598 SKETCHES OF EMrKEXT AMERICAKS. 

court and jury. His learning is less profound than accurate, less com- 
prehensive than particular. He is endowed with a large share of what 
is called hard conamon sense — a most invaluable trait in a lawyer, 
and which compensates for the absence of more showy accomplish- 
ments — to which he adds what is equally essential to success in any of 
the walks of life, a thorough knowledge of mankind. There may be 
much in his speeches that is irrelevant to the matter in hand, but what 
is relevant and important is sure to be found in them ; and if a particu- 
lar string in the human heart is to be touched, he knows where, when, 
and how to touch it, so- as to obtain the response he calls for. The 
same characteristic enthusiasm and perseverance which have marked 
his career in other respects have distinguished his course at the bar. 
If he undertakes a case, he devotes himself to it, heart and soul, for the 
sake of justice, truth, the cause of his client, and his own reputation. 
He is overborne by no difficulties, and dispirited by no failures in the 
progress of his cause. It is his determination to succeed, in defiance of 
all obstacles, that so often crowns his labors with singular success, con- 
trary often to the expectations of his friends and his opponents. 

Since the year 1S24, Mr. Eaves has generally represented his dis- 
trict, either in the house of representatives or the Senate of South 
Carolina. He has great personal popularity and influence, but in ob- 
taining his seat in either branch of the legislature he has generally en- 
countered pretty serious opposition, with the exception of the last can- 
vass, in 1849. when he was returned to the senate without opposition. 
As a politician he has no consolidation propensities, but is a thorough 
consistent state-rights democrat, of the Jefferson school. In 1830, Mr. 
Eaves, in common with many other politicians, was somewhat slow in 
making up his mind as to the expediency of nullification, but finally 
avowed himself in favor of that measure. His hesitation, however, 
prevented his obtaining a seat in the state convention, which passed 
the nullifvins ordinance, althoutjh he received the nomination of his 
friends. The same cause operated to prevent his return to the state 
senate at the next election, when he was defeated by a most respect- 
able and popular opponent. The question with him then was simply 
a question of expediency. In principle he is, and always has been, an 
advocate of the doctrines of state-rights and state-sovereignty, as laid 
down in the celebrated Virginia and Kentucky resolutions of '98 and 
'99. Perceiving his error on that occasion, he has always since ex- 
pressed his opinions on all vital questions with promptitude, firmness, 
and decision, and after having once taken his position,, has maintained 
his opinions with intrepidity and zeal, suffering nothing to divert him 
from his purpose. In the recent controversy of South Carolina with 
the federal government, growing out of the slavery agitation, he was 
among the first to take part with the secessionists, and to advocate a 
withdrawal of the state from the Union, as preferable to a continuance 
in it in a state of perpetual hostility. He believed that it was not only 
the right, but the duty of the state to secede, rather than submit longer 
to unjust and unconstitutional legislation, which placed in continual 
jeopardy not only the property, but the lives of his fellow-citizens, 
and threatened to overthrow the pillars of constitutional liberty itself. 
Though the party with which he acted on this occasion was ultimately 



>ATHAKIEL RLDLEY EiTZS, OF SOUTH OAROLIKA. 599 

defeated, he has not seen cause tc retract or abandon its principles — 
principles which he adopted from a thorough conviction of their con- 
sen'ative character, and which he still approves. Mr. Eaves is, at this 
time, a member of the state senate, bat having signified his intention 
to terminate his long legislative career, he has declined being a candi- 
date for re-election. 

We now turn to a portion of Mr. Eaves' history upon which his 
friends are apt to dwell with no less pride than pleasure, and which 
ought to render his name conspicuous in our American annals. 

When a requisition was made, by the general government upon the 
state of South Carolina, for one reg'ment of volunteers to serve during 
the war with Mexico. Mr. Eaves was among the hrst to volunteer his 
services, and took an active part in raising the company which marched 
from Chester District — the first district in the state which responded to 
the call for volunteers. He made several speeches at the court-house, 
appealing to the patriotism of his fellow-citizens, and persuading them, 
with all the enthusiasm so peculiar to him. to enrol their names in the 
company. But when he beheld the tears and distress of the women, 
■who were alarmed at the prospect of a temporary, if not a final, separa- 
tion from their husbands, his own sympathies were deeply moved. He 
then insisted that no married man should volunteer — that they should 
stay at home and take c-are of the women and children — a proposition 
which was applauded by all present, and which difiused joy and kindled 
gratitude where only feelings of grief and sadness were experienced be- 
fore. As the young men rushed forward to enrol their names as volun- 
teers, he exclaimed, amidst the applauses of the crowd. *• ^^ e are mak- 
inc soldiers faster than the Mexicans can make buUers to kill them I"' 
Tne company thus raised was composed of young unmarried men of 
unblemished character. Mr. Eaves neither sought, nor would he accept, 
any office in the company, except that of bearing the flag presented to it 
bv the ladies, but volunteered in it as a mere private soldier, although 
he had lone held a military commission of a high grade. Subsequently, 
however, when the reciment went into active service, he was appointed 
bv Colonel Butler to disburse the appropriation of twenty thousand 
dollars made by the state for the use of the regiment. At the termina- 
tion of the war. \k accounted to the state for every dollar of the fund 
expended by him as disbursing officer. Although unaccustomed to 
hard labor, he endured, through all the vicissitudes of a trying campaign, . 
the faticues of a common soldier much better than numbers who were 
accustomed to labor on a farm. By strict attention to his diet, he ge- 
nerallv enjoyed excellent health, and. while many young men returned 
home* with constitutions impaired by an unwholesome climate and 
habits ot indulgence, he returned to his country in better healt*h than 
he enioved whe'u he left it. He fought in the ranks as a private, in 
everv" battle in which his regiment was engaged in Mexico, in all of 
which battles he displayed the coolest bravery, and was always found 
in the front rank inciting to victory. He used a fine percussion-lock 
musket, presented to him by Major Huger, of the United States Ord- 
nance Department. After the army had arrived at Puebla. and during 
the time of their stav there, an order was issued by General Scott for 



600 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

the soldiers to return their muskets to the ordnance department, in or- 
der that such as required it should be repaired for service, inasmuch as 
the army was about to march in a few days for the city of Mexico. 
Major Huger, having heard favorably of Mr. Eaves, sent for him, and 
told him "he wanted to make him a present of a musket, on condition 
that he would not dishonor it, and would name it the Huger gun." 
Mr. Eaves replied, that " he would cheerfully name it as requested, and 
that his bones should bleach on the heights of Puebla before he would 
dishonor the gun !" They separated, and next met in the city of Mex- 
ico, when Major Huger said, " he rejoiced to meet him ; that he had 
heard a good report of him ; that when he gave him the gun, he felt 
confident that he would sustain his character for bravery." Mr. Eaves 
brought this gun home with him, and values it highly. 

It may be interesting and profitable to follow the course of this gal- 
lant soldier from the time of his leaving South Carolina, early in Janu- 
ary, 1847, till his return home the following December, and to point 
out some of the most interesting incidents that happened to him and his 
brave associates during the interval. Fortunately, most of the letters 
written by him to his friends during his absence, have been preserved, 
so that he may be made the narrator of his own progress. 

The order calling the regiment into immediate service and directing 
the several companies composing it to rendezvous at Charleston, was 
issued during the session "of the legislature of the state, and whilst Mr. 
Eaves was in attendance as a member of the senate. Having obtained 
leave of absence, he returned to Chester court-house in time to take up 
the line of march with his company from that point. This march he 
performed on foot to Columbia, a distance of sixty miles, starting on the 
5th of December, 1840, and reaching Columbia on the 8th day of the 
the same month. He proceeded thence with the company to Charleston. 
After being regularly mustered into service, and the regiment not be- 
ing ready to proceed, he obtained a furlough, and returned to Columbia 
on the 13th December, to attend to his legislative duties. The follow- 
ing letter was then written by him to his sister, Mrs. Esther Buford, of 
Chester C. H. 

" Columbia, Dec. 14, 1846. 

" Dear Sister, — I received your kind letter on my arrival yester- 
day, from Charleston. I am well ; but the blisters on my feet, which 
were occasioned by marching from Chester to this place, are not yet 
well, and they are somewhat painful. Friends from all quarters of the 
state greet me whenever they see me. The Charleston people speak 
in the highest terms of the Chester company. Yesterday morning, I 
left the company at Camp Magnolia, three miles this side of Charleston 
— all well, except a Mr. Brakefield, who was quite indisposed from a 
cold taken on the route. I called at his tent before I left, and found 
him better. 

" I obtained a furlough to repair to this place to perform my duties 
in the legislature to the end of the session. I shall return to the camp 
■on Saturday, the 1st proximo. 

" Please go to my farm and see that my negroes are well clad. Do 



NATHANIEL RIDLEY EAVES, OF SOUTH CAROLINA. 601 

the best you can for me in nny absence. I have an abiding hope of 
seeing you all again. Remember me to your daughters. 

" I remain, affectionately, your brother, 

"N. R. Eaves." 

The next letter in order before us is one addressed to C. D. Melton, 
Esq., attorney-at-law, Chester C. H., and is dated, 

" Off Mobile Bat, January 29, 1847. 
" Dear Sir, — I have only to say that we have encountered unpa- 
ralleled hardships. We have been anchored in this bay one day and 
night, and experienced a storm yesterday and throughout last night, 
not equaled or surpassed in this region for twenty years back. Our 
sufferings are, at this time, extreme. One vesssel came in sight of us 
with volunteers who wished to get on board. The storm was so great 
they had to fly for safety. In attempting to get ashore, the small ves- 
sel was wrecked, and they had to swim three quarters of a mile. They 
are this morning being placed on the Alhambra, the vessel in which the 
colonel and suite, with myself and four companies, are. Tliere were 
one hundred and sixty persons, it is said, on board a steamboat that 
was blown up last night, including nearly one hundred ladies. The 
ladies, it is said, were nearly all saved — the men nearly all lost their 
lives. This morning, those who witnessed the catastrophe represent it 
as the most awful sight they had ever seen. I am in good health. 

" Your's truly, 

N. R. Eaves." 

We hear nothing further of Mr. Eaves till his arrival in Mexico. His 
first letter written thence is addressed to his connections, Messrs. S. 
Alexander and C. D. Melton, and is as follows : 

"LoBOS, Mexico, February 28, 1847. 

" Gentlemen, — I have not received a letter from any one in South 
Carolina since I left Camp Johnson, at Hamburg. We arrived at this 
place on the 12th instant, and have been here ever since. We start to- 
morrow for Vera Cruz. Forty or fifty ships will sail at the same time. 
The enemy have been looking and preparing for us. All the dis- 
tinguished men of the army are here, except Generals Taylor and 
Worth. It is believed we shall be received with a severe strusrsle. La 
Vega is commander of that place. It is General Scott's determination 
to attack it, for weal or for woe, between this and the tenth of March. 
We expect to encounter great peril in landing, as it will doubtless 
be under a heavy fire from the enemy. Time must develop the result. 
" We have suffered since we left Hamburg more than I will here at- 
tempt to describe. Afler we arrived at Griffin, Georgia, we had 
to encounter all the inconveniences of cold incident to a severe winter, 
until we reached Mobile. When we left that point and got aboard the 
ship Alhambra, we were seventeen days in crossing the gulf of Mexico, 
till our arrival at the place we now are. We encountered all the 
perils of three northers, known to be so dangerous in this region. In 
fact, we all thought we should be lost. One ship in our company was 



602 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

lost, filled with Louisianians, about ten miles from this point, and 
between this point and Tampico. The next day we passed the wreck, 
and saw many Mexicans on the shore, gathering the valuables that 
were drifted from the ship. The poor ship-wrecked fellows all got on 
shore in the enemy's country, — about three hundred of them, and only 
saved fifty of their guns. They struck for Tampico. The Mexicans 
heard of them, and assembled a large force; but before they attacked 
them, they called on them to surrender. The officer in command asked 
for four hours to consider what to do. As soon as the Mexicans retired 
to their location, the officer caused a large number of fires to be built, 
with a view to delude them. As soon as the fires began to burn, 
he struck for Tampico, the nearest point of safety, and arrived there 
without being attacked by the Mexicans. 

" In one of our vessels, there were between five and six hundred 
souls — soldiers and officers. We encountered every peril incident to 
sea-life, except a shipwreck. One poor soldier died on the voyage. We 
buried him on Sunday, in the usual method of burials at sea, by envi- 
roning his body in a coarse sail-cloth shroud and a blanket tightly corded 
over it. To the feet were attached about 400 lbs. of bricks. He was 
laid on a broad plank on the edge of the ship, and, after the reading of 
a solemn and impressive service, the body was plunged into the water, 
and went down as so much lead. I was anxious to see the last of the 
poor volunteer, and got a good way up on the ropes above the hull 
of the ship, when 1 witnessed the whole ceremony. 

" On the 12th of February we landed oft' the island, and, on the 13th, 
went on shore. It is a fairy little spot, about one mile in circumfer- 
ence, and six miles distant from the main land. It was covered with 
vines and shrubbery of numberless kinds, with the India-rubber and 
the lime tree, together with flowers of every variety of hue, and 
in great abundance. The island appears to be a formation of decom- 
posed shells, of which there are many rare and curious specimens. 
The climate, during the day, is intensely hot, and during the northers, 
which occur about every six days, and which continue to blow from one 
to three days, there is a continual north wind, the harshness and cold- 
ness of which try the stoutest constitutions. After this, the weather 
becomes calm and serene, and the heat continues to increase in intensity 
until it becomes almost intolerable. Then, after about six days, 
another norther commences, and these variations of climate and tem- 
perature continue until about the 15th of April. 

" Colonel Butler is with us, and will continue with us during our 
stay on this island. General Twiggs called on us yesterday, and will 
remain with us until to-morrow, at which time we shall all leave 
for Vera Cruz. He speaks of the Palmetto regiment as one of the 
finest he ever saw. This small island, but a few days back, was 
a desert wild ; — now it is lined with tents, and has five or six thousand 
occupants. Several thousands have not landed, but remain in the 
vessels. Adieu! 

" Yours truly, 

"N. R. Eaves." 

An anecdote is told of Mr. Eaves, which proves that the most 
intrepid valor is not proof against the overpowering assaults of sea- 



NATHANIEL RIDLEY EAVES, OF SOUTH CAROLINA. 603 

sickness. On the passage from Mobile bay to Lobos Island, a violent 
storm arose, during which most of the soldiers, including the colonel 
of the regiment, were very sea-sick, and retained their berths. Mr. 
Eaves, getting out of his, seized hold of the cabin door in order to sus- 
tain himself, uttering as he did so some exxjlamations, which afforded 
his friends, particularly the colonel, much merriment, and which were 
often repeated afterwards at his expense. Not aware that he had 
auditors, Mr. Eaves thus soliloquized: ''Here am I, N. R. Eaves, 
from Chester. I had friends, home and wealth, as much as any reason- 
able man should ask, and here have I thrown myself on the mercy of a 
rude element that has no mercy. But give me one foot again on terra 
firraa^ and I defy creation !" 

It appears from a letter subsequently written to Mr. Melton, that the 
army did not leave Lobos Island until the 3d of March. On the 9th, 
the disembarkation of troops commenced ; on the 13th, the investment 
of the city was completed ; on the 18th, trenches were opened at night; 
on the 22d, the city was summoned to surrender, — on refusal, seven 
mortars opened a fire of bombs ; on the 24th, the navy battery, consist- 
ing of three long thirty-two pounders and three sixty-eight pounders, 
Paixhan guns, opened a fire in the morning, distance 700 yards; on the 
25th, another battery opened a breach in the wall of the city. The fire 
was very destructive to the town. Early in the morning of the 2Gth, 
the enemy proposed a surrender, — commissioners, on the American 
side, Generals Worth and Pillow, and Col. Totten. On the 29th, 
negotiations were completed ; the city and castle surrendered, and the 
Mexican troops marched out and laid down their arms. The American 
troops occupied the city and batteries of the town and castle. At noo» 
of that day, the American ensign was hoisted on both, and was saluted 
by the American vessels. The garrison of about four thousand men, 
laying down their arms as prisoners of war, were sent to their homes 
on parole. Five generals, sixty inferior officers, and two hundred and 
seventy company officers, were among the prisoners. The total loss of 
the American army, from the day of lauding, (March 9th,) was sixty- 
five persons in killed and wounded. The slaughter of the Mexicans 
was immense. 

The commanding general was stationed in the city, while his second 
in command held the castle. Their regular force was about three thou- 
sand, and they had about the same number of irregulars. Outside the 
city was General La Vega, with a force of from six thousand to ten 
thousand cavalry. Colonel Harney, with between two hundred and 
four hundred United States dragoons, charged on and repulsed this im- 
mense force with terrible carnage, scattering them in all directions. 

Such was the intelligence brought by the Princeton, which sailed from 
Vera Cruz on the 29th March, after the surrender had taken place, bear- 
ing dispatches to our government, — intelligence which diffused joy, pride 
and exultation throughout all our cities and our whole Amirican popu- 
lation. Never had a siege, undertaken under such disadvantageous cir- 
cumstances, been attended with such glorious results. It is without a 
parallel in the annals of military warfare. 

In a letter addressed by Mr. Eaves to the late Samuel Weir, Esq., 



604 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

of Columbia, South Carolina, a spirited account of the investment and 
surrender of Vera Cruz is given. The following is the letter : 

« Vera Cruz, April 9, 1847. 

" Dear Sir, — I have but a few moments to write, but comply with 
my promise to write you when anything of importance occurs. We 
have taken this place, and also Alvarado, forty miles distant. 

"Had 1 time to give you a full description of the capture of Vera 
Crue, it would interest you greatly. Laying a map of Mexico before 
you, you will conceive of the chaparal, from shore to shore, as lined 
with fifteen thousand persons. You will see a small island two miles 
below the city and castle. Between that island and the shore, imagine 
you behold fifty-odd vessels, which comprise the fleet. Half of the 
above number of men are put into surf-boats, forming one grand line. 
After these boats are filled with the required number, all strike for the 
shore. When the ardent souls approach within fifty feet of the land, 
they leap out of the boats in four feet of water, and rush to the shore 
with almost deafening shouts. The boats soon return for the balance 
of the army, to which our regiment was attached. As soon as they are 
all landed the line of march is f )rmed to surround the city, keeping out 
of reach of its bombs and cannon-shots, as an incessant firing was com- 
menced upon us from the time of landing. This was on the 10th of March, 
and we had all our cannon, munitions of war and provisions to land, and 
roads to cut through the roughest country your eyes ever beheld. It 
took us from this time to the 21st to fix the batteries and get prepared 
for the attack. In the mean time, the infantry had made the necessary 
roads, and the road was now filled, from shore to shore, two miles in 
extent, with living souls. During their advance, frequent skirmishes 
took place, when some were killed, and Colonel Dickinson and others 
were wounded. 

"The line being completed, no Mexican was permitted to go into the 
city or to leave it. Rumor said there were five hundred trying to get 
in, but they were afraid to make the attempt. About one-third of the 
cannons and bombs were fixed on batteries, and delay was threatening 
to be an evil. General Scott determined to commence an attack on the 
22d March, which he did. General Worth's battery was placed six 
hundred yards southeast of the town, and the marine battery between 
this and the gulf, east of the town, and some three or four guns west of 
Worth's. Matters being thus arranged, we commenced a heavy and 
incessant fire on the town, which was kept up day and night, till the 
evening of the 25th, when the enemy sent out a white flag, soliciting a 
truce of twenty-four hours, in order to bring in their dead. The General 
granted them four. Early in the morning of the 26lh they again com- 
municated with General Scott, proposing to surrender the town, castle, 
military stores, cannon, &c., and stating that they would be prepared to 
make the surrender on the 29th, which accordingly they did. 

" I should have stated, that before we commenced cannonading and 
bombarding the town, the General sent in a white flag requiring them 
to surrender, and if not disposed to do this, requesting them to remove 
the women and children, and also giving an opportunity to the minis- 



NATHANIEL RIDLKY EAVES, OF SOUTH CAROLINA. 605 

ters of other nations to leave. General Morales disdainfully replied to 
this by saying that he would not surrender, nor would he remove the 
women and children ; that he would defend the city with his best skill 
and ability so long as one particle of the materials of which it was com- 
posed adhered to another, and then turned and waliied off. The minis- 
ters did not leave, nor the women and children. 

" On the night of the 22d, the soldiers having nothing to do but await 
the order for a charge, and the nights being clear with moonlight, 1, with 
hundreds of others, ascended some barren sand hills to witness th^ fir- 
ing. I must say the scene was grand beyond description, each party 
apparently contending with the other which should shoot the most and 
the fastest. I became much excited at times, when it would appear that 
the enemy had the advantage of us ; but soon again we could see our bat- 
teries again letting loose on them. We could see the bombs coursing 
through the air by the match and hear them falling on the houses and 
in the streets. Many houses were greatly injured, and are, at the time 
I now write, undergoing repairs. Such is the case with the great tavern 
situated on the Plaza where 1 am quartered. 

" After we had taken this city. General Quitman's division, to which 
the Palmetto regiment was attached, was ordered to go and take Alva- 
rado, forty-five miles distant. We started on the 30th March for that 
place, but on our arrival, found it perfectly defenceless. All had fled 
except a few who were friendly to us. We took thirty-four pieces of 
cannon and placed them on board our ship, which is still left there. 
We returned in eight or nine days from the time of starting from this 
place, and have been here ever since. The army has been marching 
by parcels, for several days back, to Jalapa. We expect to follow in 
three or four days. 

" I remain, yours truly, 

"N.R. Eaves." 

Mr. Eaves complains, in his letter of the 28th Febniary, written to 
Messrs. Melton and Alexander, that he had received no letters from 
South Carolina since he left. It must have been highly gratifying to his 
feelings, therefore, when perhaps he began to believe himself neglected 
by his friends, to receive the following kind and complimentary letter 
from his Excellency David Johnson, then Governor of South Carolina, 
written in reply to a letter of Mr. Eaves, of the 22d March : 

"Columbia, \5th May, 1847. 
"My Dear Major, — Your favor of the 22d March, although written 
so long ago, contains so many exciting incidents that I took the liberty 
to give it to the press for publication, in the belief that it would be ac- 
ceptable and interesting, not only to your personal friends but to the 
public generally. By me it is the more appreciated as coming from 
a tried friend, one who, prompted by patriotism alone, has given up all 
the comforts that wealth could afford, and the enjoyment of social life 
in the midst of numerous friends, to become the tenant of "the tented 
field," and breast the dangers of the battle-field. But you will have 
your reward. Our people, one and all, take the deepest interest in all 
the privations and sufferings of our gallant Palmetto regiment, and will 



606 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

receive all our sons, on their return, with open arms. Old Chester will 
not forget her own. 

" Our last advices locate the Palmetto regiment at Jalapa, and the 
advance of the army at Perote, driving the enemy before you, or 
rather scattering them to the winds. Such is our confidence in our 
children that there is an universal regret and sympathy felt for you 
that you were not in a position to share in the signal and glorious vic- 
tory of Cerro Gordo, We know, however, that it was not of your 
own seeking, or your own fault. It would be cruel to wish it ; but if 
another trial of strength must come I should delight to hear that the 
Palmetto banner waived in the front of the storm, for I know the regi- 
ment will prove worthy of the state they represent. 

" We have very little local news of interest. The most exciting is a 
visit from the Hon. Daniel Webster, of the Bay state. He is now 
here, having visited Charleston. He has received, both here and m 
Charleston, the attentions and courtesies due to his high attainments 
and character, and will go away better informed of our peculiar in- 
stitutions, and well satisfied with the usage he has received at our 
hands. Of your immediate connections I have no information of re- 
cent date, and 1 suppose they keep you advised of everything that con- 
cerns themselves. The courts of appeal are now in session, and 
necessarily all the judges and your friends of the bar are present, all 
in good health and spirits, except our friend Chancellor Harper, whose 
health, although much improved, is not yet perfectly restored. 

" Pray let me hear from you frequently, at least from every stage 
on your route to the city of Mexico, which is understood to be your 
destination. Remember 3'our friends when revelling in the halls of 
Montezuma. 

"Very truly and sincerely, 

" David Johnson. 
"Major N. R, Eaves." 

The next letter of Mr. Eaves which informs us of the progress of 
events and of the army in Mexico, is one bearing date June 3, 18-17, 
written from Puebla, and addressed to Messrs Melton and Alexander. 
It is a voluminous epistle, containing a narrative of the most important 
events that had happened to himself and to the Palmetto regiment from 
the time of their leaving South Carolina up to the time when the letter 
was written. As an account of many of these occurrences has been 
given in previous letters, we shall make only such extracts from the 
one before us as seem to be necessary. 

Some misapprehension appears to have prevailed at home as to the 
part which the Chester company had taken in the investment and 
capture of Vera Cruz. Mr. Eaves, anxious to maintain the honor of 
that very gallant company, says of it, in the letter before us, in the 
way of vindication : 

" I see that it is the impression of the Chester people that their boys 
took no part in this victory. This is a great mistake. Immense work 
had to be done before the bombardment of the city could take place. 
This work was to be done during the night-time. Hence our regiment 
had to furnish its quota, which was one hundred men every night, and 



NATHANIEL RIDLEY EAVES, OF SOUTH CAROLINA. 607 

never did men labor harder or more zealously than they did in digging 
ditches, and in making embankments, and forts, which were erected 
within six hundred yards of the city. The enemy all this time were 
firing on us from the city, and we literally had to dodge them, or their 
balls would have destroyed hundreds of our men while they were con- 
structing roads to surround the city through immense sand hills. These 
sand hills are enclosed with shrubbery of every kind, while the valleys 
are filled with chaparal and vines, all appearing parched to death for 
want of rain. Now, sirs, I assert that our regiment did as much, and I 
say more, in preparing for the bombardment than any other part of the 
army, up to the time of loading and shooting the cannons, which be- 
longed alone to the gunners of the army." 

In this letter we have an account of the surrender of the city, and as 
it is peculiarly characteristic, we shall take leave to insert here : 

" I was present," he says, " at the scene. As I looked around on the 
pretty green plain, about two miles long and one wide, lined all around 
with soldiers, clad in their best attire, I thought I had never witnessed 
a grander or more imposing sight. Scott, Worth, and the other officers 
of the army standing in the centre of this plain, looked as if anxiously 
waiting to march into the city. On the arrival of the appointed hour 
thirty-five hundred or more Mexicans, coming from the city, first form 
a line of about a mile, and after stacking their guns, form a line within 
the stacked guns. Presently come all the citizens, from the infant 
slung to its mothers back, up to the oldest, including the sick, the lame, 
halt, and blind, so as to include all. When I ran my eyes up the American 
line, grandeur, greatness, and power, occupied my thought?. When I 
cast them along the Mexican line, nothing but misery and wretchedness 
appeared, and sorrow and pity agitated my breast. I began to regret 
that I had ever come so far to fight such a miserable, pitiful, and worth- 
less people. This scene repaid me for all my sorrows, trials, and 
difficulties. After all the officers on both sides had advanced, and the 
necessary forms of surrender had been gone through with, the whole of 
the Mexicans were ordered to march, which they did, advancing into 
the country, and our army, at the same time, commenced marching 
into the city. They marched slowly, with five or six bands of a choice 
quality accompanying them. 

" At this period I was at a loss how to follow, as Colonel Butler was 
not present. Being unwell, I thought I would play old soldier on Gen 
Scott and all the rest. I was neatly clad in my military habit, with 
polished sword and belt. As the officers passed me, I called up some 
twenty young men, who were well mounted, and asked them if they 
wished to go into the city with the first Americans who entered, and see 
the Mexican flag go down, and the American flag go up. They said they 
would do anything I ordered to get a-going. 1 then told them to form 
a line two deep. I took the head ; ordered them to march on, which 
they did — all giving way to us, recognizing us as a guard, I halted in 
the Plaza, which is a long space, with extensive buildings on all sides. 
There I remained till the officers dismounted, and took their seats in 
their respective departments. I then ordered my men to march, took 
them through all the streets, in order to witness the destruction that 
had been effected, and then dismissed them to go to their respective 
quarters." 



608 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

Reasons are assigned in this letter why Mr. Eaves and the Palmetto 
reginaent were not present at, and did not participate in, the battle of 
Cerro Gordo. 

"We returned from Alvarado," he says, "under a forced march, in 
order to overtake Generals Worth and Twiggs, who had commenced 
their march onward to Mexico. They had a severe fight at Cerro Gordo 
on the 17th, 18th, and lOth of April. We, under a hurried march, en- 
deavored to be with them; but the battle ended on Sunday, the 19th, 
and we arrived there on Wednesday, the 22d, following. Gen. Scott 
probably intended that our regiment should remain behind, that it 
might serve as a rear guard, upon which the army might fall back in 
case of necessity. As an evidence of this, after we had taken up the 
line of march, he ordered our regiment to remain at a village some 
seventeen miles from Vera Cruz, and there wait vmtil further orders. 

" I, now having leisure, rode over the entire battle-ground, and so 
horrible a sight 1 never before beheld. Hundreds and hundreds of dead 
Mexicans lay putrifying in the sun — some with their legs, some with 
their arms, and many with their heads, gone. The scene was enough to 
melt with pity the most obdurate heart. I then went to the hospitals. 
There I saw numbers of our men who had lost their limbs — some a leg, 
others an arm, some shot through the body, some through the thigh, 
others through the arm, and others again through the foot. Many of 
them suffered extreme agony. I went also to see the wounded Mexi- 
cans, .where similar spectacles were exhibited, except that our own men 
had to w^ait on them and feed them, as all the well Mexicans were off, 
being frightened almost out of their lives. There was a marked differ- 
ence between the character of the different hospitals. The Americans 
were cheerful, though suffering much, while the Mexicans were greatly 
depressed and dispirited. Indulging my curiosity in this way, 1 could 
usually delay one or two hours, and then catch up with the army." 

In this letter, we have a description, from the pen of Mr. Eaves, of 
the great national road. 

" In reaching this point," he says, " we have passed over the great na- 
tional road leading from Vera Cruz to the city of Mexico. It is the 
most splendid work of the kind, probably, to be found in any country. 
It is said to have cost the Spaniards forty millions of dollars! The 
paving is of solid stone all the way over the mountains, being thirty feet 
in width throughout nearly the entire distance, with a wall of cement on 
each side, wherever circumstances require it. The bridges which are 
set over the water-courses are of a style and durability which cannot 
be surpassed in any country in the world." 

Having thus made allusion to this celebrated road, he returns, in his 
narrative, to Cerro Gordo. 

" We marched on from that point to Jalapa, Generals Scott, Worth, 
and others, having taken possession of it before we arrived. Jalapa is 
a large city, abounding with every kind of fruit. It is situated on the 
side of a large hill, so large that it may almost be called a mountain. 
All the streets are paved. We encamped two and a half miles beyond 
the city, on the way to Perote, where we remained several days. We 
then took up the line of march, intending, as we proceeded, to attack 
that ill-fated place where every tenth man of the Texans who were cap- 



KATHANIEL BIDLET EAVES, OP SOUTH CAROLINA. 609 

tured by the inhabitants was shot. I saw in the castle there the skulls 
and bones of the Texans thus killed, heaped up in a mound, in the centre 
of which was a cross. Perote is quite a handsome city, situated at the 
foot of several mountains, and near the great perpetual snow-mountain 
called Orizabo. 

" From Perote we marched to this city, Puebla, where we arrived 
on the 13th May, after passing through many fine villages. At Anco- 
zoque, twelve miles distant, Santa Anna, lying hid behind some large 
sand-hills, with fifteen thousand men, suffered General Worth to pass 
on without interruption. His object was to attack our division, which 
was enfeebled by disease and forced marches up the mountains, he sup- 
posing that we were a day's march behind Worth ; but in this he was 
mistaken. By pursuing our course with great expedition, night and 
day, we had nearly come up with General Worth's division, who, dis- 
covering that Santa Anna was between him and us, turned upon the old 
fox, and soon put him and his forces to flight. Our regiment arrived in 
time to form a line of battle. The sight of us coming up precipitated 
their flight. Had we been aware that we were so near the enemy, we^ 
could have intercepted and captured Santa Anna without failure. At 
this battle, as he called it in his dispatches, he admitted that he had lost 
one hundred and fifty men, but stated, at the same time, that he had 
killed fifty Americans. The truth is, we lost none. 

" We then took up the line of march, with three thousand effective 
men and one thousand sick, together with wagoners and teamsters, 
making in all four thousand. We marched until we got within one mile 
of this city, and halted. Soon after this was done the citizens hoisted 
a white flag. This was the day of the election of President. As we 
passed through the city, they looked voracious enough to eat up our 
little band alive. I tried to make the best observation I could, and I do 
believe, although in this I may err, that there were eighty or a hundred 
thousand Mexicans present on this occasion. We got possession of the 
second finest city in Mexico, and have been stationed here ever since. 

" Puebla is the handsomest city I have seen, in or out of our 
government. It is about two and a half miles long and one and a-half 
wide. The streets are straight, and run parallel with each other. The 
side-walks are all elegantly flagged or paved with hewn stone. It is 
called the "City of Steeples." There are forty -four splendid cathedrals 
in the city, some of which are said to have cost ten millions of dollars. 
There are three, hundred resident priests, whose personal appearance 
and dress are somewhat peculiar and worthy of note. They have upon 
their heads a round place from which the hair is shaved, in circumfer- 
ence about the size of an ordinary tin cup. In some the denuded spot 
is smaller. Around the head, an inch above the ears, and up to this 
point and all below, front and rear, the hair is shaven off". At a dis- 
tance, they look as if they had a black belt two inches wide around 
their heads ; and, to complete the picture, they have the body part of 
their hats made low and round, apparently to fit their heads close- 
ly, with a brim a foot wide, which they bind over the crown in the centre. 
They wear this hat on all occasions lengthwise, front and rear. In 
other respects, their dress is not wholly unlike that of the priestly order 
in Catholic countries. I must defer giving you a description of the 

39 



€10 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. - 

cathedrals, convents, and other public edifices, to another opportunity. 
They are costly, and built on a scale of great magnificence. 

"'When Santa Anna made his escape from our troops, he fled to 
Mexico, where he caused himself to be proclaimed president ; but in a 
few days his seat became so uneasy to him, that he called together the 
powers of the government, gave up the national keys, and announced 
his intention to retire to private life or leave the empire. 

" We -will march shortly to the city of Mexico, at what time pre^ 
cisely I cannot say. Our fates we cannot predict, but our watchword 
is ' Onward, let come what may !' 

" I am in a wonderful country, and cannot understand how a popula- 
tion of eighty thousand souls should allow an army of only three thou- 
sand effective men to take such a populous and magnificent city as 
this. 

" Your's truly, 

» N. R. Eaves." 

The next letter of Mr. Eaves is addressed, like the preceding one, to 
Messrs. Melton and Alexander. It is as follows : 

"San Augustin, Mexico, Aug, 30, 1847. 

" Gentlemen, — I wrote you both by Captain Kennedy. I hope you 
got those letters, as they furnished a detail of facts up to our arrival at 
Puebla. 1 here send you an account of occurrences from that period 
to the present. 

" We left Puebla on the 8th of August, and, afler a fatiguing march, 
arrived at this place on the evening of the 19th inst. The battle of 
Contreras was commenced by the divisions of Generals Pillow and 
Twiggs; and the New-York and South Carolina regiments, which com- 
posed the second brigade of General Quitman's division, under the 
command of General Shields, were sent to their support. Contreras is 
a strongly -fortified place, situated on a road leading to the city of Mexi- 
co from the west, and about eight or nine miles distant from it. From 
this place our regiment passed through a pathless region of country, 
almost inaccessible, over precipices of rock that appear to have been 
thrown up by some volcanic eruptions, and. through a dense shrubbery, 
with all kinds of cactus, which made it more difficult to pass. Our 
regiment was on the march that night until one o'clock, when a halt 
was made at the village of Contreras, about one mile above the battle- 
ground, and between it and Mexico. It rained hard all night, which made 
it the most disagreeable night I ever experienced. I was not in the battle 
of Contreras with the regiment, owing to this cause : I had a horse, and 
not being able to ride or to lead him over the precipitous pathway, I 
followed on till I quite lost the route of the regiment, and it being very 
dark, I was injured by a fall on a cluster of cactus. Falling in with 
Captain Martin's artillery force, I there remained all night. 

" By daylight in the morning, Colonel Riiey, with his regiment of 
rifles, and I with them, charged the enemy. They fled before the charge, 
and were intercepted by the Palmetto regiment, which was situated be- 
tween Fort Contreras and the city of Mexico, about a half mile from 
the fort. The fort, cannon and munitions of vwar were soon in our pos- 



NATHANIEL RIDLEY HAVES, OF SOUTH CAROLINA. 611 

session. We captured a hundred and eighty-one Mexicans, and left a 
hundred and twenty dead on the field. Among the prisoners of war 
was General Mendoza, who surrendered his sword to Colonel Butler, 
while the junior officers and soldiers surrendered their swords and guns 
to Captain Dunovant. Captain Marshall was left at this battle-ground 
to guard the cannon and munitions of war, and to take care of the pri- 
soners. During his stay there, he took forty odd prisoners more. Of 
course, he, and those with him, were not in the subsequent battle that 
was fought, which they regretted exceedingly. It is said that the Pal- 
metto regiment displayed a degree of skill and bravery in the battle at 
Contreras unsurpassed by any regiment in the army. I joined my 
regiment early that morning, before the close of the battle, and before 
they had prepared to commence their line of march to the subsequent 
battle, that of Churubusco, In this battle, all the officers and soldiers 
of the Chester company were engaged, and won for themselves unfading 
glory." 

Mr, Eaves, while twining round the brows of his companions in arras 
deserved laurels, omits, with his characteristic modesty, to refer to the 
part which he himself enacted on this occasion, but which, from the 
gallantry and coolness he exhibited, richly deserves notice, and cannot 
be omitted in this connection. Having to take care of the prisoners 
and the wounded, the Palmetto and New-York regiments were delayed 
and prevented from being present in season for the first attacks on 
Churubusco and Tete-de-Pont. They were ordered, on their arrival, to 
make a demonstration back of the forts and the city, where they en- 
countered the rear-guard of Santa Anna's army. The New-York regi- 
ment was in advance of the Palmetto, and, upon the first fire, which 
was very heavy, they recoiled and took shelter behind a hacienda. The 
South Carolina regiment came forward, formed a line, they being the 
left regiment, and Mr. Eaves, being a member of company B., the left 
company of the regiment, was thrown in a position where he could be 
well noticed by all who were engaged. He stepped to the left, and in 
advance of his company some five paces, and there, although exposed to 
a galling fire of seven thousand escapades, by which one-half of the 
Palmetto regiment fell, either killed or wounded, Mr. Eaves, still 
maintaining his self-possession, on each time after discharging his gun, 
would cock it and blow into the muzzle to ascertain if the touch-hole 
was clear and open, and then deliberately re-load and fire. 

The gallant Colonel Butler, who was the mess-mate and bosom com- 
panion of Mr. Eaves, fell at Churubusco. It made quite a change in his 
camp life — a change that he was entirely unprepared for. His servant 
Edmond, who had followed him through the campaign with the greatest 
fidelity, was sick. So it became necessary for the hero of this biogra- 
phy, who has been so properly entitled " the little warrior," to mess about 
with his companions without any definite place for shelter. But his 
position was a proof of how much he had endeared himself to each 
member of the regiment and other officers of the army, for all claimed 
him as their friend, and were anxious to prove the fact by giving him 
the largest share of their scanty meals. Eventually he became the 
mess-mate of the officers of the Chester company. They were proud 
that he had cast his lot among them instead of choosing for his com- 



612 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

panlons those who were higher in office and who had intreated him to 
partake of their fare. 

On the 13th of September, he was at the charge on Chapultepec. 
The hill and castle are surrounded by low, flat grounds, with deep 
ditches made there for the double purpose of defence to the castle and 
irrigation of the tillable lands. They are so deep that the soldiers 
could only pass through them with the aid of each other. It was his 
misfortune to be in one of the deepest of these ditches until his com- 
panions, who had passed through by his assistance, were all on the flat 
lands. Forgetting that they had left him in this position, they advanced 
at double quick time. He strove to climb the bank, but all his efforts 
were vain. He then commenced wading through the mud and water, 
hoping by some chance to gain his regiment again. Discovering some 
soldiers of another regiment who had deposited themselves there for 
safe-keeping, he told them that " they were cowards, and unworthy the 
name of American soldiers," and commanded them to assist him out 
of his difficulty. But they were so panic-struck that they threw him 
out on the wrong side, when he had the mortification to see his regi- 
ment approaching the wall at the base of the hill beneath the enemy's 
batteries. There he stood a target for a thousand escapades, yet re- 
solved to die fighting. It was at this time and place that, as he raised 
his head to aim his musket at some one whom he thought worthy of 
being shot by him, a ball struck the palmetto on his cap, and passed 
through, slightly grazing his head and tearing private papers which he 
had placed in his cap for safe-keeping. 

When the regiment arrived beneath the wall and were secure from 
the enemy's fire until a breach could be made in it through which to 
pass, Mr. Eaves' perilous position was seen by all. He was not able 
to proceed, and was too brave to occupy that much detested ditch, 
which seemed to defeat his dearest purpose, to live or die with his regi- 
ment. But he was no sooner seen than some of his brave companions 
volunteered to bring him to the regiment or perish with him — a pur- 
pose which they triumphantly accomplished, but not until he was twice 
wounded and his clothes much torn. He reached his regiment just as 
the breach in the wall was made sufficiently low to be scaled, and 
being assisted by his companions, he was in their eagerness literally 
thrown over, being among the first to enter. Regaining his feet, he 
seized the Palmetto flag, mounted the clifi", rushed up through the castle, 
where, having first assisted to run up the American flag, he mounted 
the parapet, and with his gun in one hand and his regimental banner in 
the other, he stood conspicuous, waving it with the oft-repeated excla- 
mation, " Hurra for South Carolina !" The cheering was not confined 
to his regiment alone, but all who saw it with one impulse joined in a 
long and loud huzza for the flag and the gallant spirit who bore it! 

But the glories of that day were not yet ended. There were other 
glories to be yet achieved by that gallant army before the sun had set. 
Scarcely had the army realized the fact that the castle was theirs, when 
they were ordered to advance along the aqueducts, in order to charge 
the forts and take possession of the city of Mexico, which lay about one 
league distant. The gallant Quitman, who commanded the division 
against the Garita de Belen, to effect his object with the more certainty 



NATHANIEL RIDLEY EAVES, OF SOUTH CAROLINA. 613 

put a rifle and a musket alternately, that whilst the latter was making 
the charge the former might act as sharp-shooters to take the enemy 
from their cannon. The promptness and decision with which the com- 
mander's orders were executed soon rendered victory complete, and the 
Palmetto banner floated triumphantly in the city of Mexico two hours 
in advance of any other American standard. (See General Quitman's 
Report.) In this engagement Mr. Eaves acted with his accustomed 
coolness and intrepidity. His conduct was observed by Gen. Quitman, 
who exclaimed, "See little Eaves, — how cool he is ; as though he were 
shooting at snipes !" 

When the division entered the city, it was impossible to get the 
heavy American cannon of Captain Drum's command over the high and 
well ditched fortifications of the Garita de Belen ; but there was a piece 
of artillery within the breastworks, placed in such a situation that the 
Mexicans could not get it out. Drum had but few soldiers with him, 
and he called upon some of the Palmetto regiment to assist him. There 
were two companies of the Pennsylvania regiment and the rifle regi- 
ment present. Upon the call being made upon the Palmetto regiment, 
Mr. Eaves and several others obeyed the call, and assisted in adjusting 
the piece, and turning it upon the enemy, continued to man the piece 
until the ammunition was exhausted. Drum, putting his hand on the 
shoulder of Eaves, exclaimed, " We have given it to them !" and after 
leaving the cannon two or three paces, was shot in two !" 

After the entrance of the army into the city of Mexico, Mr. Eaves 
found many occasions for the exercise of his feelings of humanity and 
generosity. Hundreds of the wounded Mexicans lay in the streets, 
neglected by their countrymen and exposed to all the anguish of their 
sufferings without the kindly ministrations of a friend, or even the com- 
fort of a shelter from the weather. As these instances would fall under 
his observation he would set about the relieving of their condition, a 
work in which he would often draw liberally on his own purse. In 
other instances he would, assuming an air of authority, compel the 
heartless citizens, who carelessly passed by their suffering fellows, to 
remove them into houses and provide for their necessities. 

The same promptings of generosity influenced his conduct towards 
his companions in arms. The sick found in him an attentive and 
watchful friend, who would suffer them to want for nothing which 
money could purchase. His purse was, indeed, at all times open to the 
drafts of his companions, and no one ever found his necessities disre- 
garded. To various members of his regiment he liberally supplied the 
means of returning to their friends and their country, and that, too, very 
often without the prospect of being repaid. 

It was the intention of Mr. Eaves, when he left South Carolina, to 
return home in season to perform the duties that devolved on him as 
senator at the ensuing session of the general assembly. The war was 
now, in fact, ended. All the fighting that was to be done was over, 
and there was nothing, so far as the honor of his country was concerned, 
to detain him longer in Mexico. He accordingly applied, soon after 
the entrance into the city, for leave of absence for six months, which, 
in consideration of the circumstances, was readily granted, and he was 
honorably discharged. 



014: SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

The following are the documents connected with his discharge : 

" City of Mexico, October 26, 1847. 

" To Capt. H. L. Scott, A. A. A. General. 

"Sir: — I have the honor to request a furlough for six months, 
to enable me to return home to discharge the duties of my civil office, 
being Senator from Chester District, South Carolina. The legislature 
of that state convenes on the 4th Monday in November next, and it is 
important that I should be there as early as practicable. 

" N. R. Eaves, Private Co. B. 

" Palmetto Regiment^ 

" I certify that private N. R. Eaves is the State Senator from Chester 
District, South Carolina; that he has been doing duty in my company, 
and was present, fighting valiantly, in all the battles fought in the valley 
of Mexico, (except at Molino del Rey, in which the Palmetto Regi- 
ment was not engaged,) and that he behaved with credit and distinction 
to himself, having been slightly wounded in four places. I therefore 
respectfully recommend that his request be granted. 

" R. G. M. DuNovANT, Capt. Co. B. 

" S. C. Volunteers." 
" Approved, 

'" A. II. Gladden, Major Com. Pal. Peg. S. C. V. 
" City of Mexico, October 20, 1847." 

" Respectfully referred and recommended, 

"Saml, E, Watson, Lt. Cam. First Brig. V. Z>." 

" City of Mexico, October 26, 1847. 
" To Capt. H. L. Scott, A. A. A. General. 

" It is due to N. R. Eaves, private in Company B., Palmetto Regi- 
ment, S, C. v., to state that he is the State Senator from Chester Dis- 
trict, and whilst discharging his duties at Columbia, S. C, in that 
office, a call was made by the Secretary of War upon the state for one 
regiment of volunteers, to serve during the war with Mexico. He left 
his seat in the Senate, and promptly repaired to his district and enrolled 
his name as a private, 

" From the high position he occupied, and the patriotic motives that 
induced him to volunteer, the field-officers were induced to place in his 
hands the $20,000 appropriated by the state and placed at their dispo- 
sal. He has therefore acted in the capacity of paymaster to the regi- 
ment. As that fund is now nearly exhausted, and feeling disinclined 
to see him shoulder his musket, the call for his civil services induces 
me respectfully to request that his petition be granted. He has been 
in all the battles fought in the valley of Mexico in which his regiment 
participated. On these occasions, he shouldered his musket, and 
behaved with great gallantry and bravery. 
" Very respectfully, 

" A. II. Gladden, Major Pal. Peg. S. C. F," 

" I have known Major Eaves since his arrival at Lobos, and found him 
always attentive to his duty, and at all times ready for any service. 

" D, E. Twiggs, Br. Gen. U. S. A.' 



NATHANIEL RIDLEY EAVES, OF SOUTH CAROLINA. 615 

" I have commanded the Palmetto Regiment at all the battles fought 
in the valley of Mexico, and can vouch for the bravery and gallantry of 
Major Eaves in all those battles, as well as for his good conduct on all 
occasions. 

" James Shields, Brig. Gen.'''' 

" Respectfully referred and recommended. 

"Saml. E. Watson, Lt. Col. Com. 1st Brig. Vol Biv." 

"Recommended by 

'• J. A. Quitman. Maj. Gen.'' 
*' Honorably discharged, 

" By command of Major-General Scott." 

" H. L. Scott, A. A. A. General." 
" Head-quarters of the Army, October 20, 1847." 

"National Palace, Mexico, October 28, 1847. 
" Major Eaves, — Sir : — Allow me to take the liberty, now that you 
are about to leave for your native land, to present to you my heart- 
felt regret at your departure. 

" A companion and soldier, one who has shared all the perils and 
fatigues of this campaign, cheerful under every sky, and foremost in 
every engagement! 1 am certain, sir, you have nobly represented 
your district and state, and I trust a grateful country will respect your 
patriotic disposition. 

" With great respect, 

" Your friend and servant, 

" N. J. Walker, Capt. Go. K., S. C. F." 

Shortly after receiving his discharge, Mr. Eaves embarked for South 
Carolina, via New-Orleans. Upon his arrival in Columbia, at night, a 
torchlight procession was formed, and he was conducted through 
the city in triumph. The legislature being then in session, the Senate, 
of which he was a member, adopted, on the next day, a report and 
resolutions highly complimentary to him. The following is the report 
of the Senate committee to whom were referred the documents and 
correspondence connected with his discharge : 

" The Committee on the Military and Pensions, to which was refer- 
red certain documents in relation to the Honorable N. R. Eaves, sub- 
mits the following report : 

" The committee have given the subject referred due deliberation. 
The documents show, that in December last, the Honorable N. R. 
Eaves was the Senator in the present General Assembly from Chester 
District ; which fact comes within the knowledge of your committee, 
and of the whole Senate: that he united himself as a private in the 
company of the Palmetto Regiment raised in Chester, his native dis- 
trict,* and, although in affluent circumstances, and arrived to an age 
when military service is not required by law, he cheerfully submitted 

* In this the committee were in error. As already stated, Mr. Eaves was 
a native of Virginia. — Ed. 



616 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

to all the privations and dangers of a perilous and harrassing campaign. 
He was entrusted with the responsible duty of disbursing the appropri- 
ation of twenty thousand dollars, made by this state for the use of the 
Palmetto Regiment, and from this and other considerations, service in 
the ranks was not exacted. Voluntarily and from his own impulsive 
and chivalrous nature, he shouldered his musket and fought in the ranks 
as a private, in every battle in which his regiment was engaged in 
Mexico. At Vera Cruz, at Contreras, at the bloody fields of Churu- 
busco, Chapultepec, and the Garita, he was found in the front rank, 
leading on the advance, cool, collected and brave. 

" Such patriotic devotion in one of its own members deserves the 
special notice of this Senate. 

" Your committee recommend that the documents referred be entered 
on the journals of the Senate, as a tribute of regard for patriotism and 
public virtue. 

" Respectfully submitted, 

" John Buchanan, Chairman.'''' 

When the venerable president of the Senate, Angus Patterson, 
rose to read the resolutions, the Senate chamber was crowded to 
the utmost extent of its capacity. The scene was an exceedingly inter- 
esting one. Mr. Eaves, anxious to take his seat in the Senate cham- 
ber, was, as we have seen, one among the first to return from Mexico 
after the war was over ; and his presence again in the Senate chamber, 
after an arduous and glorious campaign in a foreign land, in which the 
chivalry of the state was triumphantly vindicated by the Palmettoes, 
coupled also with the mournful reflection that the blood of a Butler, a 
Dickinson, and a host of others equally patriotic, had sealed their devo- 
tion to their beloved state, altogether produced an excitement, and gave 
rise to emotions of no ordinary character. 

Mr. Eaves responded in terms very graceful and delicate. *' He 
thanked the Senate," he said, "for the very cordial manner in which he 
had been welcomed again to his seat in that body. After the hard 
campaign, in which the American troops had been engaged, to be thus 
met on their return to their native land, was grateful to that sensibility 
so natural on such an occasion. In entering the service of his country, 
he had done what he conceived to be his duty. A call had been made 
by the Federal Government upon the State of South Carolina for 
a regiment to be engaged for the war. He regarded the honor of the 
state as involved, and that the call should be responded to promptly. 
The state had been traduced, and we had been jeered as par excellence 
* the chivalry.' When the opportunity therefore was presented to her 
people to vindicate their title to the just renown emblazoned on 
the pages of their history, it found him ready. The promptitude with 
■which the call was met, was in the remembrance of all. How the Pal- 
metto Regiment performed its duty, history will tell. Its decimated 
ranks and orphan condition told a tale more eloquent than anything he 
could say. He left it to others to fill up that picture which would 
sparkle amid the lustre of those achievements which adorn our history." 
He concluded by again thanking the Senate for the kindness they had 
manifested towards him. 



NATHANIEL RIDLEY EAVES, OF SOUTH CAROLINA. GlT 

Mr. Eaves had then to encounter a storm of congratulations from his 
surrounding friends, which was equal in intensity to that which he 
faced at Churubusco, though of a far different and more agreeable kind. 

His excellency, Governor Johnson, was among the first of his dis- 
tinguished friends to welcome him on his return. The following note 
was addressed to him by that high functionary on the occasion : 

" Mr Dear Major, — Welcome, thrice welcome back to us! I want 
to see you much ; but I learn that you are so surrounded by inquiring 
friends, that I fear there is no hope of having that quiet coramunioa with 
you that I wish to-night. How are you? How are your gallant com- 
panions? Where are they? 

" Very sincerely, 

" David Johnson. 
*' United States Hotel, Monday Evening.'''' 

The warm reception which this brave man met with from his excel- 
lency, the governor, and from the legislature, was not more gratifying 
to his feelings than that which awaited him from the people at large. 
His entire career in Mexico was known to all and applauded by all. 
From the mountains to the sea-board there was but one sentiment felt 
and expressed as to his merit. But nowhere was his welcome more 
cordial and enthusiastic than in the district he represented, old Chester. 
He had performed his duty nobly, and the state was not only delighted 
to see him return, unscathed by the numberless perils through which he 
had passed, but seemed desirous to evince their gratitude and admira- 
tion by bestowing upon him some signal honor, as a reward for his ser- 
vices. He was accordingly, in various sections of the state, almost 
simultaneously, on his arrival home, nominated by the press for the 
office of governor; and there can be but little doubt, if the election had 
come on when the popular enthusiasm was at its height, that he would 
have been elected to the office by an overwhelming vote ; and there 
can be as little doubt, that had he been elected when the contest 
did come on, his practical good sense and executive abilities would 
have qualified him to discharge the duties of the gubernatorial function 
to the entire satisfaction of the people of the state. The relations which 
the South then sustained to the Federal Government were of a delicate 
nature, and wore a threatening aspect; and there were those who feared 
that the impetuosity of Mr. Eaves' temperament unfitted him for the 
crisis. Others, again, were influenced by an aversion, common to the 
people of the state, of bestowing the gubernatorial office as a reward for 
military services. 

That his election was anticipated and desired by the whole body of 
the Palmetto Regiment, then in Mexico, is evident from the tenor 
of the following letters, with the introduction of which we shall close 
this rather prolix narrative : 

^ "San Angel, Mexico, January 13, 1848. 

*' Mr Dear Friend : — I had thought you would have written me be- 
fore this, but I suppose you are determined to treat me with the same 
indifference that my other friends do. 

•• I am told that you met with a cordial and warm reception at home 



618 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMEKICAN8. 

and that every body was glad to see you. You richly deserve to be 
esteemed and honored by your vv^hole country for the gallant services 
rendered by you on the battle-fields, and I hope that your name will be 
handed down to posterity as one of the heroes of Churubusco, and 
Chapultepec and Garita. The boys frequently talk about you, and re- 
gret that your civil duties called you away from among us. They 
frequently ask me if I think the state will recompense you for your 
trials and sufferings, by making you governor, or sending you to Con- 
gress. 1 tell them that I think she will. * * * * 

" I remain, very respectfully, 

" R. G. M. DUNOVANT." 

The above letter, it will be seen, was written by Captain Dunovant, 
from Mexico, shortly after Mr. Eaves arrived in South Carolina. The 
following, from Lieutenant Walker, was written about three months 
later : 

" San Angel, Mexico, list March, 1848. 

"Dear Major, — I am just contemplating and trying to fathom how 
many honors you have, how many you have received, and how many 
more you are entitled to receive. We hear some news in regard to 
you occasionally, and it is quite good, to be sure, but I think they seem 
to be rather slow in awarding honors in a manner to be felt as lasting 
and important to one who has devoted so much of his time to the best 
interests of his district; one who, when the call of his country was 
heard, was ready to throw off honor, wealth, and ease, to engage in the 
capacity of a soldier, and who, in the short space of twelve months or 
less, has passed, with distinction, through four of the bloodiest battles 
on record. If services like these do not entitle a man to the highest 
gift in the state, what can he do to entitle him to such honors 1 To this 
I can only answer, that it is perhaps requisite that he be a representa- 
tive of the lower part of the state. 

"When your friends speak of you why do they not do it with more 
energy, with more zeal, and speak to be understood ? Yet there are 
some omens of good, and one of the strongest of these is, that we do 
not hear you spoken of for the governorship in one or two districts, but 
it comes in letters from every district in the state, and all that is wanting 
is more heat. In all probability there is enough of that at home, though 
not sufficient to satisfy your friends here. 

" The boys are all well and in good spirits, but we miss you very 
much. The days and nights are tolerably long at times, and if we had 
your company it would be a great assistance in making time glide by. 
1 wish, if there is no hope of our getting home soon, that you would 
keep the young ladies from marrying until we do return; and also in- 
form us, by some means, what you are doing with them for us. But 
I must inform you of a slander that Major Mat. has put out on you. 
He says you are trying to marry yourself, and if that is the case I fear 
you will not do much for your friends. How is it 1 And, by the 
way, I should like to have you write, for you best know just what 

would please us. - , 

********** 



NATHANIEL RIDLEY EAVES, OF SOUTH CAROLINA. C19 

"Captain Brooks says, 'By Ned, Eaves shall be governor!' He 
sends his best respects to you. Major Dunovant ditto, and all the 
boys unite in sending their best -wishes to you. 

" Your obedient servant, 

" J. T. Walker." 

We find among the numerous documents connected with Mr. Eaves, 
campaign in Mexico, a series of letters in relation to a certificate oi 
merit to which he was entitled, but which, having not been filed in the 
office of the secretary of war, or if placed there, having been lost or 
mislaid, has unfortunately, up to this time, not been recovered. The 
facts are briefly these : General Scott, after the battles in Mexico, issued 
an order directing the captains of companies each to report two soldiers 
of his company who were most worthy of distinction. In accordance 
with this order Captain Dunovant, of company B., Palmetto regiment, 
reported Mr. Eaves to General Quitman, as having especially distin- 
guished himself during the campaign, and General Quitman, as is sup- 
posed, reported him in like manner to General Scott. But Mr. Eaves 
having left Mexico before the army was disbanded did not receive his 
certificate of merit. Considering himself, however, as entitled to it, he 
made application for it through his friends, supposing that a copy of it 
would be found on file in the office of the secretary of war. 

Among those friends who interested themselves in this matter was 
Lieutenant D. D. Baker, of the marines, in service in Mexico, a gallant 
officer, who was promoted to a captaincy after the battle of Chapultepec. 
We have from him the following letter : 

"Portsmouth, N. II., Feb. 15, 1848. 
"Mr Dear Old Soldier, — I was in Washington a few days ago, and 
made inquiries at the office of the adjutant-general for your certificate 
of merit, but was informed it had not been received at that office. I 
have no doubt it will be forthcoming in due time. It gave me great 
satisfaction to hear from you, both on the account of your good health 
and also the flattering manner in which your fellow-citizens received 
you on your arrival home. I am sure that nothing in the way of notice 
can equal your merits, for a more gallant and devoted soldier on the 
field I never saw. I send you herewith a note from the office of the 
adjutant-general, about your certificate of merit. 

" Believe me to be your friend and fellow-soldier, 

" D. D. Baker." 

ITie following is the note from the adjutant-general, referred to in 
the above letter of Captain Baker : 

" Adjutant-General's Office, 

"Washington, July 19, 1848. 
" Dear Sir, — In returning herewith the letter of Mr. Eaves, I respect- 
fully inform you that not a single recommendation in favor of volunteers 
for certificates of merit, under the 7th section of the act of March 3, 
1847, has been received at this office. The orders of Major-General 
Scott, alluded to by Mr. Eaves, have been referred to, and are such as 



620 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

he represents, but what action, if any, was taken under them, I regret 
tny inability to say. The law referred to, 1 had supposed, did not em- 
brace the volunteer service. For, if otherwise, it would present the 
incongruity of one of the subalterns of a company of volunteers receiv- 
ing his commission from the president of the United States, while the 
others, the captains and field-officers, derive their commissions from 
the governor of the state. 

" I am, dear sir, very respectfully, 

" Your obedient servant, 

" R. Jones." 

There are numerous others letters of correspondence on this subject, 
■which are omitted. It is certain that the order of General Scott to 
the captains of companies, volunteers as well as regulars, to report 
those who had, in their respective companies, most signally distin- 
guished themselves, was promptly obeyed by the captain of the com- 
pany to which Mr. Eaves was attached, and that he was singled out 
and reported as being the most worthy of the certificate of merit. To 
the soldier nothing is dearer than his honor, and nothing more gratify- 
ing to his feelings than the having his merit duly recognized and ac- 
knowledged, and it is much to be regretted that, so richly deserving 
the meed of praise awarded him, he has been unable to obtain its formal 
acknowledgment in a "certificate of merit." 

We are happy to find that the opinion we expressed, in the earlier part 
of this sketch, of the legal character and attainments of ]\Ir. Eives is 
fully sustained by the opinions of a gentleman of great worth, who has 
long known him intimately. 

"The success," he says, "which has attended him in the practice of 
his profession has been far beyond that which ordinarily falls to the lot 
of those who have made the law their study. Without having a high 
reputation as a learned lawyer, he nevertheless, by the assiduity and 
perseverance with which he managed every case entrusted to him, se- 
cured a lucrative practice. Men who entertained no very exalted opi- 
nion of his legal attainments were willing, to entrust their interests with 
him, knowing that, if anything would be made in the progress of the 
cause, his diligence and untiring efforts would be sure to accomplish it. 
Like a cork on the water, if put down in one place, he would be certain 
to rise in an another. His success, in a great measure, is to be attributed 
to the extraordinary industry and untiring devotion he invariably 
brought to the management of every cause in which he has been en- 
gaged, no matter how unimportant it may be. Slow to announce an 
opinion at first, he would, when engaged in the cause, apply the whole 
powers of his mind to its thorough examination, and never rest until he 
had completely mastered it. His great knowledge of human nature 
has enabled him to command success where other men would have 
failed. The precise adaptation of the means to the end has secured him 
many triumphs. Oftentimes, in cases of great doubt and difficulty, 
when the law's delay would have given him time, he seldom failed, at 
the last moment, to seize upon and present something that would be de- 
cisive of the issue. If he could not carry his point by a coup de main. 
he was very certain to do so by slow and regular advances." 



NATHANIEL RIDLEY EAVES, OF SOUTH CAROLINA. 621 

Another friend, who knew him equally well, having pursued his legal 
studies under his direction, and who is every way competent to judge, 
says of him : "Mr. Eaves is not so much to be judged by his conver- 
sational talents, his forensic powers, or his skill as a writer, as by the 
happy adaptation of himself to the circumstances under which he has 
passed his entire career." 

Mr. Eaves was never married ; but one of the most pleasing traits in 
his character is its tenderness, liberality, and gallantry, to the fair and 
better sex, particularly to the widow and orphan, and to those who are 
in any kind of distress. 

No man is more consistent in his friendships. Once a friend he is 
always one — never abandoning an acquaintance so long as he retains 
merit, and often adhering to him even after others have forsaken him. 

With all his wealth and success at the bar, he is free from pride and 
an aristocratic temper, being equally the friend of the poor and the rich, 
and disposed to treat all with justice and humanity, without regard to 
their station. If he has his partialities, they lean, and justly, too, rather 
to the side of the feeble and unfortunate than to that of the strong and 
prosperous. He is especially kind to those who are indebted to him, 
and against whom he has claims of a long standing. He prefers aban- 
doning the claim and releasing the debtor, to subjecting him to distress 
and inconvenience. If he were to meet an old acquaintance in China in 
destitute circumstances, he would greet him with cordiality, and relieve 
his necessities. Notwithstanding his remarkable generosity, he has ac- 
cumulated a large fortune by his industry, which he does not hoard up, 
but devotes to useful ends and public improvements, particularly to the 
improvement of the place where he lives, with whose interests and pros- 
perity he is so closely identified, that to destroy him would be to de- 
stroy the very elements of the society around him, of which he forms 
the soul and centre. But he is not known only at home favorably. 
There is scarcely an individual in the state to whom his name is not fa- 
miliar ; and he could not go into any village or town in South Carolina 
where his presence would not be welcomed with cordiality. 

Upon the whole, Mr. Eaves, if not a great man, is a useful one. 
What he lacks in genius is better supplied by common sense — want of 
a knowledge of books, by a knowledge of the world, and by a shrewd 
insight into the springs of human action. A man that has succeeded as 
he has done must be judged by results ; and judged by that rule he 
must, as he does, possess moral and intellectual worth. Kich in wealth, 
he is far more rich in honor and integrity. He has the simplicity of a 
child and the boldness of a lion. He is a man of undoubted courage 
and a keen sense of honor. Nothing would induce him to do a mean 
action. In fine, w^e shall sum up all his good qualities by affirming that 
he is 071 honest man, and that he is fairly entitled, in the judgment of his 
cotemporaries, to that patent of nobility to which the poet rel'ers whea 
he says : 

" An honest man's the noblest work of God." 




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jn-'\' POPE, OK TENNESSEE. 623 



5 

I JOHNPOPE, 

PRESIDENT OF THE UNION BANK OF TENNESSEE AT MEMPHIS. 

Colonel John Pope, the subject of this memoir, is a native of Georgia, 
and son of Leroy Pope, a prominent merchant of that state, and received 
the early part of his education at the distinguished academy of Dr. 
Moses Waddell, in South Carolina. He was a particular favorite of 
the old Doctor, and it was under his admirable discipline that he ac- 
quired his studious and moral habits of character. It was a proverbial 
saying of the Doctor that he had a golden head. He stood at the head 
of his class, and particularly in composition. On leaving the institution 
at sixteen years of age, on the occasion of the annual exhibition, the 
highest honor for composition was awarded him by his class. 

In his youth he manifested a decided penchant for punning. As an 
evidence of which the following may be cited. It occurred while a 
boarder in Dr. Waddell's family at the Willington Academy. It was a 
practice with the old Doctor to put out Latin phrases to the students at 
table, to translate impromptu. On one occasion, coming to little Pope's 
turn, the Doctor challenged him with, "Dum vivimus vivamus." Good 
butter was a luxury with which the students were but seldom indulged. 
Prompted by an irresistible impulse to give the words a free and 
pointed translation, he quickly replied : " Whilst we have butter, let us 
have it." Accordingly, at the next meal. Aunt Betsey — the familiar 
soubriquet by which all the students called the Doctor's wife — pre- 
sented them with a plate of fresh butter by the positive dictum of the 
old Doctor. 

It may be well to recall to public recollection the internal administra- 
tion of this celebrated academy. That great conservative feature of 
criminal jurisprudence — the trial of offenders by a jury of their peers — 
was adopted and successfully practised by President Waddell. Moni 
tors or inspectors were appointed weekly, and every Monday e vening, 
in the presence of the students assembled in the Academy Hall, they 
made a public expose of all the transgressions and delinquencies ob- 
served during the preceding week. Whereupon, a jury of seven stu 
dents were appointed by the president, and the case of the offenders 
referred, with instructions to bring in their verdict the next afternoon. 
And no criminal judge on record was ever more stern and inflexible in the 
prompt execution of the verdict of the jury. In the performance of this 
duty an amusing incident is related of the subject of this memoir. The 
monitor had reported an allegation against one of the students that 
he was " guilty of lying, and dodging from his recitations." He was 
foreman of the jury, brought in a true bill, and recommended, as a 



624 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

remedy for his almost incurable malady, that the president administer 28 
grs. of hickory powder, in broken doses, at intervals of five minutes, by 
the stimulating application of the same to the naked calves of his legs, 
and that he be deprived of his daily rations at twelve o'clock, for a week, 
by two hours' close confinement in the dungeon [alias the Academy 
Hall.) A few days after this, Augustus B. Longstreet, then a student, 
and the distinguished author of the "Georgia Scenes," wrote a very 
humorous parody on the whole transaction. 

About this time his father removed to Huntsville, Alabama, and he 
was sent to Cumberland College, (now the University of Nashville,) at 
that time under the presidency of Dr. Priestly, a celebrated scholar and 
divine, who devoted many of the best years of his life to teaching. The 
Hon. E. H. Foster and John Bell were his classmates, with whom 
mutual feelings of strong personal regard were formed, which have been 
warmly cherished to the present day. After remaining about one year 
he was transferred thence to Yale College, where he completed his edu- 
cation, after a term of three years. His residence in Yale was charac- 
terized by studious habits, and a devoted attention to the cultivation of 
his literary taste apart from his classical studies : hence the high reputation 
he acquired in his class in the department of composition. The class 
was large^and distinguished for its many talented members. Among the 
number were the Hon. John M. Clayton, and Isaac Holmes, of South 
Carolina. It was during his residence in college a literary periodical 
was established, edited by the three best writers from the senior class. 
When the time arrived for making these selections, the honor was con- 
ferred on him with two others — the most distinguished writers of the 
class — the Hon. Thomas A. Marshall, of Kentucky, and John D. Eckles, 
of North Carolina, who took the first honors of the class. 

In the distribution of commencement honors he was among the 
highest participants. On leaving college he promptly commenced the 
study of law in Georgia. But in this he was suddenly checkmated by 
the marriage of a Miss Louisa Rembert, the daughter of a wealthy and 
a highly respectable planter — a lady no less remarkable for her per- 
sonal beauty than for all the amiable and accomplished qualities of her 

BBX. 

Becoming possessed of an independent estate, his vocation was sud- 
denly and permanently changed into that of a cotton-planter. His loca- 
tion was in the vicinity of Huntsville. No man is more fascinating in 
his manners — entertaining or instructive in his conversation — lively, 
but never frivolous — happily mingling dignity with easy familiarity. 
His disposition naturally inclined to the facetious ; with a playfulness of 
manner that made him a favorite in every circle in whichh e moved, 
he possessed in a high degree the art of infusing into others the joyous- 
ness of his own feelings. The frankness of his deportment and the 
purity of his morality have exercised over his youthful associates a last- 
ing and beneficial influence. 

On the third year of his residence he was elected to the legislature. 
During the session several questions of important state policy were 
discussed. In the debates he took a prominent part. He was conspicu- 
ous for his efforts to change the system of voting by balloting into viva 
voce, and lost the measure by only two votes. His speeches on this 



JOHN POPE, OF TENNESSEE. 625 

subject were published, and highly lauded at the time. After the close 
of the session, on his return to his family, he was warmly received by his 
constituents, and urged to become a candidate for Congress in opposi- 
tion to the Hon. Gabriel Moore, an old and popular politician. But he 
declined, excusing himself on the ground that he was too young a man 
to take the field against such an old political stager. The following 
year he removed to an adjoining county, where he zealously devoted 
himself to his favorite pursuit, in which he was always emulous of that 
prominent success that has marked his career. After a few years' resi- 
dence in his new abode, the voice of the people urged him to become a 
candidate for the legislature, for the avowed purpose of reforming the 
odious practice of treating, according to the fashionable system of 
electioneering, at that time prevalent throughout the southwest. 

Upon him devolved the duty of denouncing the practice from the 
stump. This he did in a bold and fearless manner, and was triumph- 
antly elected. The demoralizing tendency of treating was so glaring, 
and regarded as such a school of intemperance, that good and patriotic 
men doubted whether the country had not better give up the right of 
suffrage, provided the exercise of it could not be separated from a practice 
so fruitful of evil. It was a common declaration, that no man could be 
elected to office who did not resort to it. Yet Col. Pope not only refused 
to treat, but during the whole electioneering campaign denounced the 
custom as improper — pernicious to morals — the whole tendency of 
which was to corrupt and trammel the freedom of the ballot-box. The 
power and eloquence with which he assailed this pernicious custom were 
such, that from that time the practice has fallen into disuse. 

During the session he was a prominent advocate of all works of in- 
ternal improvement. He also prepared an able report on the subject 
of disposing of the public lands, granted by the Federal Government to 
the State of Alabama, for removing the obstructions in the Muscle 
Shoals in the Tennessee River. The wisdom of the suggestions of that 
report time has proved, though the legislature rejected the most 
prominent of them. He also made zealous and spirited efforts to 
change the common law, so as to give to married women a vested 
interest in property, independent of their husbands — a measure, the 
wisdom, the equity, and the utility of which has been recognized by 
the action of the legislatures of most of the states. On this occasion, 
however, though his efforts were sustained by the best talent of the 
legislature, yet the " lordly pride of man" was invincible, and its defeat 
stood as a blot on the legislative escutcheon of the state, until within a 
year or two past the gallantry and justice of her sons revived the mea- 
sure, and passed it into a law. 

The claims of a growing family, and his still increasing fondness for 
agricultural pursuits, caused him to turn a deaf ear to the urgent solici- 
tations of his numerous personal and political friends to continue longer 
in public life. The following year he moved to the western district of 
Tennessee, at a period when the new, undeveloped condition of the 
country presented a fine field for the enterprising devotee of agriculture 
Here he resolved to devote his individual attention to his favorite voca- 
tion of cotton planting, in which he was not only emulous to increase his 
fortune, but to elevate the dignity of the pursuit, by bringing to its aid not 

40 



'626 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

only practical science, but skill and observation, and all the appliances 
of personal emulation. With this view he was prominently instru- 
mental in organizing an agricultural association in the vicinity of Mem- 
phis. The beneficial results which this association has effected for the 
cotton-growing interest of West Tennessee and North Mississippi, are 
best told by the fact, that before the improvements introduced by it, 
Memphis cottons were in low repute ; but since that period they have 
been so much improved in quality, as to command the highest prices 
given for short-staple cotton. Yet Memphis is near the limit of the 
cotton-growing region. A further evidence of the value of these im 
provements, and of the superiority of the Memphis cottons, is to be found 
in the fact that, at the " World's Fair," it stood at the head of the list 
of short-staple cotton — received three medals,* and the highest com 
mendations from the vast multitudes that inspected them. 

There is, perhaps, no man in all the southwest to whom more justly 
belongs the high merit of having shown how two blades of grass might 
be grown where but one grew before than Colonel Pope. He was not 
only industrious, enterprising, and successful as a planter himself, but 
was the exciting cause of the same elements in others. Many of tha 
most valuable hints for the improvement of the quality of cotton (thfo 
chief object to which his attention, as an agriculturist, has been directed; 
are of his suggestion. Mechanics have availed themselves of his valua- 
ble opinions as to the construction of gins and other machinery for cleans- 
ing cotton. Nor have his thoughts on the best mode of tillage been less 
valuable. He stands this day a living example of the superiority of aK 
educated mind when directed to agricultural pursuits. 

When he located his cabin in the beautiful and fertile " Western 
District" of Tennessee, the whole country, for a hundred miles around 
Memphis, in every direction, was an unbroken wilderness. What is 
now the city of Memphis was then but little more than an Indian trad- 
ing post, the staple commodity of which was deer-skins and venison 
hams. The country was almost without roads — streams without 
bridges — churches and schoolhouses few and far between. All these 
wants were to be supplied, not by money, but by the labor of the pio- 
neer. In these labors he was an active and zealous co-operator. But 
his efforts in the way of improvement did not stop here. As the re- 
sources of the country developed, he early foresaw the necessity and 
value of a higher and more extended system of improvement. He was 
among the very first ever to speak of the practicability, importance, and 
necessity of connecting the Mississippi Valley with the Atlantic sea- 
board by a railway. The writer of this sketch remembers an animated 
conversation between General E. P. Gaines and Colonel Pope on this 
subject, nearly twenty years ago. Indeed the scheme of the Memphis 
and Charleston Railroad was first concocted at an internal improvement 
convention held at Bolivar, Tennessee, in 1834. General Gaines, John 
Pope, and Robertson Topp, were appointed by the convention to address 
memorials to Congress, and to the legislatures of the states directly in- 
terested, and also to the people of the Mississippi Valley generally. It 



* John Pope, G. L. Holmes and Samuel Bond. 



JOHN POPE, OF TENNKS8EK. 627 

devolved upon Colonel Pope to address the memorials to the states. 
The memorials were handsomely responded to by the governors of 
Georgia, South Carolina, Alabama, and Mississippi. 

With the sagacity of an educated mind, he early foresaw the great 
geographical advantages possessed by his new location, and set himself 
to work with vigor to avail himself of them. His spirited example was 
followed by others, and the result has been a revolution in the appear- 
ance and the productions, as magical as ever the transforming wand of 
industry performed in any other part or era of the world. In every en- 
terprise, from marking out and opening the most obscure road to 
the giant scheme of the Memphis and Charleston Railway, Colonel Pope 
has taken an active, willing, and conspicuous part. Nothing was too 
high or too low for his active zeal if its tendency was to develop the re- 
sources or add to the conveniences of the country. And one of the chief 
beauties of all these excellencies of private character and public spirit 
is, that it has all been done without his seeming to know or think that he 
had done anything more than every one else, or that he has more than 
half discharged what his feelings told him was his duty. 

In 1832 he was invited by a public meeting to become a candidate 
for the convention to revise the state constitution, and repeatedly after- 
wards to represent the county in the state legislature. He was also 
named as a candidate for Congress — all of which he respectively de- 
clined. In November, 1845, the great internal improvement conven- 
tion, of which the. Hon. John C. Calhoun was president, assembled in 
Memphis. For general intelligence and acknowledged ability this con- 
vention has certainly never been surpassed by any similar body of men 
assembled in the Union. Colonel Pope was chairman of a committee on 
agriculture, and submitted a luminous and elaborate report on the condi- 
tion of the agricultural interests of the country, and particularly pointed out 
the causes of the depressed condition of the cotton trade. The remedies 
which were then indicated for the evils so ruinous to southern interests 
are now acknowledged to be true — to diversify labor by a more extensive 
growth of provisions, and the introduction of manufacturing establish- 
ments. 

The city of Memphis conferred on him the honor of addressing Gen. 
Taylor on his way to Washington to be inaugurated President. 

In 1837 he experienced a severe misfortune in the death of his first 
wife. Two years after her decease he married Miss Elizabeth Hem- 
phill Jones, of Wilmington, Delaware, during a visit to her sister, Mrs. 
Mary P. Govan, in Marshall county, Miss., widow of the late Honorable 
Andrew R. Govan, and a lady of distinguished personal and intellectual 
accomplishments. Of all the fortunate incidents of his life he accounted 
his marriage with this lady one of the most auspicious. With a mind 
of the first order, and uncommonly well cultivated, she united those ad- 
mirable virtues in the character of wife and mother — that tender affec- 
tion and devoted solicitude that shed such a cheerful light upon the path, 
and upon all the domestic joys of life. But, in the twelfth year of his 
marriage with this estimable woman, the severe calamity fell upon him in 
her death on the 23d June, 1852. 

For the last eight years he has been president of the Branch Union 
Bank of Memphis, Tennessee — a station which he has filled to the entire 



628 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

satisfaction of the public, and the officers and stockholders of that insti- 
tution. He is also president of the Memphis and Somerville Plank- 
road Company. This enterprise is, perhaps, of more importance to the 
city and surrounding country than any other work of internal improve- 
ment yet projected, except the great Memphis and Charleston Rail-road. 
This work owes more to his zeal, personal influence, and diligent atten- 
tion than to any one else. Indeed he is justly called the father of this 
road. 

In 1851 the whig party of Shelby county had great difficulty in uni- 
ting on a candidate to represent them in the legislature. Very much 
against his wishes, for the purpose of reconciling the differences among 
his political friends, and in answer to one of the most flattering calls ever 
made upon a citizen for the use of his name, he became a candidate. 
By one of those shameful tricks but too often resorted to— betting on 
elections — to the disappointment even of his political opponents, and to 
the unmitigated chagrin of his friends, he was defeated by fifteen 
votes. 

Upon a review of his course, though it has been mainly in the capa- 
city of a private citizen, we see sufficient reasons to claim for him the 
character of a public benefactor. Nor is there any reason for regret 
that he withdrew so early from public life ; for, although by talent and 
education he was fully competent for the highest political positions, it 
may nevertheless be justly questioned whether his services in a public 
capacity would have been more beneficial to his country. Indeed but 
few politicians of this day have equal claims upon the gratitude of their 
country. 




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OF LANCASrJSJi . i-jS. 
FStESIDSlfT or THE LANCASTER CO'.'jmr B.~::, 



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JOHN LANDE8, OF PENNSYLVANIA. 629 

f 

JOHN LANDES, 

PKESIDENT OF THE LANCASTER COUNTY BANK, PENNSYLVANIA, 

Was born in 1785. He has filled many of the most important offices 
in his county, and has been at the head of the institution over which he 
now presides since its establishment in 1841. In 1848 he was one of 
the presidential electors. He has now retired from all active business, 
except that pertaining to the bank. 





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THOMAS COOPWOOD, OF MISSISSIPPI. 631 



CAPTAIN THOMAS COOPWOOD, 

OF ABERDEEN, MISSISSIPPI. 

Benjamin Coopwood, the father of the subject of the ensuing sketch, 
was an Englishman by birth and education, but having emigrated to 
the colonies prior to the commencement of revolutionary hostilities, he 
espoused the liberty -side of the quarrel between the oppressor and the 
oppressed ; and when the contest waxed warm, and to the unnatural 
oppression was added the physical force of the mother against the 
daughter to enforce the wrong, he entered with heart and hand into the 
conflict in favor of freedom and independence. He joined the colonial 
array, and remained in the service of his adopted country throughout 
the active operations of the war, in which he was severely wounded 
three different times. After the last great decisive battle had been 
fought and won at Yorktown, and the revolutionary storm had measur- 
ably subsided, and the thunders of the last great guns in the struggle 
were dying away in the distance, the war-worn soldier retired from the 
fields of blood and of victory in company with George Thomason, his 
future brother-in-law, to join the father of the latter in Goochland 
county, Virginia, and to supply, as best they might, the parent's loss 
of his four sons, who, from time to time, had, one by one, fallen by the 
side of their brother while fighting the battles of their country. The 
kindred sufferings of the two, and the kindly offices of the one to the 
other while in the army, evoked a sympathy and cemented a friendship 
between them which terminated not with the closing scenes of the dan- 
gers they had shared and through which they passed, but were culti- 
vated and increased with the return of peace, until a still closer bond 
of union bound them together. The former married the sister of the 
latter, and the daughter of William Thomason, whose four sons the 
two young men had left dead on the battle-ground, 

Mr. Coopwood and his wife settled in Albemarle countj', and culti- 
vated a small farm, where, in the vicinity of the rich and varied moun- 
tain scenery of the Blue Ridge, and amid the golden pomp of autumn, 
on the 11th day of September, 1793, Thomas Coopwood, whose name 
heads this article, was born. 

In the year 1801, his parents emigrated from the Old Dominion and 



[Note. — In the preparation of this biographical sketch, the writer has been 
solicitous to present only the most prominent points in the character and career of 
the distinguished individual, who, from considerations of friendship and a long ac- 
quaintance, flatteringly committed to him the task of preparing some notice of him 
for publication. He has omitted much that is interesting that he might have said, 
and which he would be fully sustained in saying by a large amount of ofBcial and 
documentary testimony, of the highest character, that lies before him ; but had he 
published all, a brief and hasty narrative would have swelled into the proportions o\ 
a history, and would have been wholly unfitted to the pages of the work in which 
this sketch appears.] 



632 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMEKICAN8. 

settled in Granger county, Tennessee, whence they removed to the 
county of Smith, in 1806. Here they purchased and paid for a large 
quantity of land for their moderate means, and thought themselves set- 
tled for life; and, doubtless, would have been but for the fraud prac- 
ticed upon them by their vendor, who sold them possessions to which 
he had no title. They were shortly after evicted by those having titles 
paramount, and with the loss of the entire purchase-money and nearly 
all of their little property, they again removed, and settled in 1809, in 
Madison county, Alabama, then the Mississippi territory, where, as 
though to verify the oft-repeated proverbial saying, that troubles never 
come singly and alone, but always in crowds — the husband and father 
died in the month of October of that year. And now, in deep distress 
and poverty, in the midst of the wilderness wilds of a new and almost 
entirely uninhabited country, save by the savage tribes of lawless In- 
dians that roamed through the deep forests that shaded their hunting- 
grounds, or swarmed on the banks of the neighboring creeks and rivu- 
lets, far away from friends and relations, the wid6wed mother with her 
nine children was left to struggle against the cold, chilling tide-winds of 
adverse circumstances, which with so bold a current had thus strongly 
set in. In this trying emergency there was no time to lose in unneces- 
sary and unavailing lamentations over the dead, while the wants and 
necessities of the living were pressing around about and within the very 
family circle of which the deceased had so lately been the head, the 
front and the protection. To hesitate was to yield to the pressure, and 
to yield was ruin. 

As soon as the humble funeral rites of sepulture were performed, a 
family council was held, and it was finally determined, and definitely 
agreed, to retrace their traveled steps and return to the county of Smith, 
in the State of Tennessee. And although the future was shrouded in 
gloom and beset with difficulties, before which the proudest might have 
bent and the boldest might have quailed, yet young Thomas, then but 
a small boy, with his mother, two sisters and six brothers, hesitated or 
failed not. He pressed on, and on he went to the place destined to 
witness the opening scenes of his noble self-reliance and youthful exer 
tions, accompanied by a determination and energy seldom equaled and 
perhaps never surpassed by any of his species. 

But now his energies were all fully aroused and he had confidence in 
himself, and all had confidence in him ; for his management in the ar- 
rangement, and skill and energy in the execution of his plans had been 
fairly and fully tested, but a few months before, in being sent by his 
father, prior to the removal thither, with a drove of cattle to their in- 
tended location in the Mississippi territory, where, with a younger 
brother, he by accident got out of provisions, and although fresh meats 
were readily attainable, yet during many weeks they must have suffered 
in the extreme for bread, but for the ready plans, prompt exertions and 
active energy of young Thomas. His brother wanted to abandon their 
flocks and return home. But this was inconsistent, and at war with the 
inclination and every feeling of the nature of Thomas. And he resolved 
neither to abandon the enterprise nor to suffer much in maintaining his 
position. He forthwith opened a trade with the Indians, although he 
had nothing to trade on. But he went it on reciprocal credit, and 



THOMAS COOP WOOD, OF MISSISSIPPI. 633 

bought and sold on time, and soon, in the speculation, he had an ample 
supply of dried venison, hams and corn, which, according to the most 
approved methods of the culinary art amongst the red merchants with 
whom he traded, he reduced to bread. And thus plenty was restored 
to the two young and otherwise starving herdsmen. 

As necessity is the mother of invention, and the infant germ springs 
from the parent seed in the rising or sinking scale of gradation from 
cause to effect, so the character of the man is heralded forth by the con- 
duct of the boy under trying circumstances, and based upon it like 
a statue rested on and fitted to its pedestal by the plastic hand of the 
master artist. And so it will be seen by subsequent developments, it 
has emphatically been in the career of him who is the subject of this 
notice. He has carried with him the disposition here discovered, as a 
basis of his movements, in every change through which he has passed 
in a long and eventful career. 

Himself young, and the prospects of the whole family overshadowed 
with melancholy forebodings of evils to come, they returned to the 
county of Smith, where, according to the plan, they were all to be kept 
together, and the younger children raised, educated and supported in 
comfort, decency and respectability. And the reader has seen what 
there was to do it with. Thomas was their chief reliance — their main 
stay. Nothing daunted, however, on their arrival in the vicinity of 
their former residence, he rented a farm, and unaided by any assistance, 
save of course the advice and care of his mother, and the labor of such 
of his brothers as were able to work, he toiled almost day and night for 
three years, during which time he had not only plentifully and com- 
fortably supported the family, and punctually paid his rents, but he had 
purchased and paid for a sufficient quantity of good land, which he 
converted into a well stocked farm for his mother, on which she moved, 
and lived and raised her children in comfort, respectability and plenty, 
and all of them with a good business education. In the mean time, 
and during the winters, when he could be spared from the crops, he 
earned the money with which the land was paid for by cutting cord- 
wood at Harbert's iron works, in the eastern part of the state in which 
he lived. 

All the while, every moment that could by possibility be spared, or 
stolen, from the pressing labors and duties that rested upon him, Tho- 
mas devoted to the perusal of such books as were within his power to 
procure — such as history, treatises on political economy, government 
and international law — Montesquieu, "Voltaire, Paine, Volney, and the 
English poets, were the chief works which fell in his way. He read 
some, however little, if it was only one page every day, at meal-times 
and nights, which supplied food for reflection and study while engaged 
at his labors, when his mind had sufficiently contemplated the condition 
of things around him, and revolved his plans for the future. This, 
however, was done without any view to, or e.xpectation of ever, either 
studying a profession or filling any responsible station in political life. 

By this time, the last war with Great Britain was declared, and the 
fighting had commenced. When the call for soldiers was made on his 
state, Thomas, now that he had provided well for his mother and family 
while he might be absent, entered as a volunteer in the service of his 



634 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

country, in the second, as his father had done in the first war with Bri- 
tain's haughty monarch. He accompanied General Jackson to the 
Creek nation, and was with him throughout, until after Weatherford, one 
of the first and boldest of the chiefs of the nation, but the last to come 
in, voluntarily surrendered himself at the Hickory Grounds to the 
mercy of the general, and proudly sued for peace. He was in most 
of the battles fought in this service, in which he acquired considerable 
reputation as a private, and popularity among the men, so much so, 
that he, young as he was, on his return home, was elected captain of 
the company in which he had served in the war, over one of its most 
popular and deserving members ; and it will be remembered that, at 
the time of which mention is now made, the position was a high station 
of both honor conferred and trust reposed. The contest was animated, 
but conducted with propriety ; for to the victor was to be awarded, by 
the voice of the company, the glory of being the better soldier ; and on 
his brow was to be worn the warrior's wreath. And, as it was consi- 
dered that it was necessary sometimes for a commander to be able to 
speak as well as willing to fight, it M'as thought expedient that to their 
military prowess and skill in marshaling men, they should add an ex- 
hibition of their oratory and skill in the arrangement of words ; so the 
two aspirants took the stump at the precinct on the day of the election. 
This last feature in the programme of the canvass was supposed to have 
been introduced at the instance of his opponent, as he was a somewhat 
experienced public speaker, and Mr. Coopwood, it was known, had 
never made the first attempt in that direction. Be this supposition, 
however, as it may, Mr. C. was not the man to permit his opponent to 
lead where he dared not follow. He mounted the stump on the spur of 
the occasion, and then and there instantly made his first experiment in 
speech-making, which so far transcended the expectations of all, as well 
as the eloquence of his adversary, that, at the close of his remarks, the 
crowd, by its applause, gave clear indication of his election, by a consi- 
derable increase on what had been supposed to be his previous proba- 
ble majority. And so it turned out. The voters went straight to the 
polls, and Mr. C. was elected by a handsome majority ; whereas, but 
for the speech, it would have been a very close election, the result till 
then being regarded by all as somewhat doubtful. This speech, doubt- 
less, had considerable influence over his course through subsequent life. 
This event for him marked, perhaps, the proudest day and the brightest 
spot in a whole life-long, varied and checkered career ; for the designa- 
tion of honor then acquired he has studiously avoided parting with ever 
since ; never, at any time, or under any circumstance, seeking any office 
in the military which would rank him nigher in point of title. And, al- 
though but a small dot in comparison with the many more important 
marks his own perseverance, industry and talents have set up along 
the course he has traveled, why should it not be the proudest day, 
and the most memorable event of his life ? It was the first step to dis- 
tinction among men in the career of a youth struggling with adverse 
circumstances through darkness up to the light. It was his taste ; and 
his good sense, too, as well as his taste, in this respect, is admirable, 
for even the general, the commander-in-chief, at last, is but the magni- 
fied captain. 



THOMAS COOPWOOD, OF MISSISSIPPI. 635 

This new position gave rise in his mind to new thoughts and new 
labors. The military became the object of his studies, combined with 
Roman and Grecian history, and the modern wars and modem tactics 
of Europe. 

Shortly after this, Captain Coopwood intermarried with the daughter 
of a neighboring farmer, settied a small plantation, and turned his at- 
tention mainly to the cultivation of the soil ; but not abating in his zeal 
for the acquisition of knowledge, he pursued his studies, as heretofore, 
at convenient times and on suitable occasions, when to do so would not 
interfere with his regular business. 

An anecdote, not generally known, which has been related to the 
writer, for the authenticity of which, however, no avouchmeYit is made, 
is here inserted, as being characteristic of the man who, though poor, 
was content with his lot, and determined to be comfortable in it, while 
at the same time he was pressing all the surrounding circumstances, 
and even the laws of nature, into his service to increase his fortune and 
elevate him above the station he then occupied. In one point of view, 
it may be regarded as a remarkable developmentof a rare combination of 
strongly marked and happily clustering mental endowments. The moral, 
however, it is believed, is an admirable one, in many points of view ; 
but particularly for its striking illustration of the adage, that where 
" there's a will there's a way," and the laws of nature will assist us in it. 

The story goes, that about the time of his marriage he purchased his 
land, first, because the soil was good, and, secondly, because on it there 
was, as he said, the most convenient and suitable building-spot for the 
dwelling of a new-married poor man that he had ever seen. On the 
site thus indicated, he determined to fix his residence, and there he col- 
lected his timbers for the building, and then invited his neighbors to 
his house-raising. None of them had seen the place selected, not even 
his brothers. They knew where the land lay ; they came on that ; 
but the site for the house they had to hunt for. It was not on that 
beautiful little circular hill, sloping off" so gently in every direction and 
losing itself in the extended plains around. It was not on the road -side 
in front; nor was it on the gentle declivity of the little range of hills, 
falling off" and wasting away into the fertile little valley beyond. It was 
not in the valley itself. These places had all been examined, and there 
were no logs, no timbers there. Where could it be 1 These were all 
the places fit for building on, anywhere, upon the whole tract of land. 
Where could be the place ? asked his neighbors and brothers one of ano- 
ther. It was agreed that the captain was sometimes a little disposed to 
quiz his friends ; but then it was not April-day ; and what was more, they 
all knew that he needed ^ house. They had not quite agreed to give up 
the hunt, disperse and return home, when the well-known crack of a 
rifle was heard in the distance from the direction of the hills in the east. 
The report was a familiar one. They knew it at once. It was the re- 
port of the captain's gun. They instantly made for the woods which 
led off" to the hills in the direction whence the sound had emanated ; and 
then another — and another shot was heard, and away in the direction 
the company hastened in double-quick time, fearing that, perhaps, the 
gunner might be too closely pressed in dangerous conflict with some of 
the many beasts of prey that, at that time, infested the forest. At last 



636 BKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERIOAI76. 

they arrived at the place ; and there, to the utter astonishment of every- 
one, away down in the deepest hollow between two of the highest hills, 
uniting and blending into one above, and forming the most beautiful 
level plain on the west, and running off, dividing, widening and wasting 
away into the cane-brake and swamp on the east; below, there lay the 
logs and there lay all the timbers for the buildings, and there, on a stump 
in the midst of all sat the captain, with his gun by his side. He had 
been shooting signal guns for the guidance of his invited and expected 
companions at the house-raising, as they might be gathering in. He 
looked like a man who had started to market with a load of plunder 
somewhat too wide for the road he traveled, and had, unfortunately, 
got wedged in between the side-walls that pressed the narrow moun- 
tain-pass, and was resting over his burthen and reflecting upon the best 
means to extricate it from the difficulty. Almost breathless and half- 
exhausted, they all at once demanded to know, what on earth was the 
matter. That was the site for his building. It was no joke. Some 
laughed and made fun of his location, others remonstrated, and used all 
the arguments they could against the impropriety and downright folly 
of building in such a place as that. His brothers got mad, and scolded, 
and swore they would go home — they would help to build in no such 
place. But there lay the logs and other timbers all around, as they 
had rolled down, on either side, from the top of the hills above to the 
bottom below, and there was no getting them away in any direction. 
The hills were too steep on every side but one, and there the cane-brake 
and the swamp presented their impassable barriers — there they were 
closed in, and there they had to stay. 

While his friends remonstrated, the captain demonstrated. He 
laid down his premises, as follows : It makes but little difference where 
the rich build ; but that the poor man had a duty to perform in this 
respect. It is the duty of the latter to build at that point on his own 
land, where concentrate the greatest number of converging advantages. 
That he, the captain, was not rich, but poor; and that the place whereon 
he stood, in the hollow, was the point on his own land, where concen- 
trated the greatest number of converging advantages, of any building 
spot on the whole tract. The major premiss was admitted. The minor 
denied. He was required to prove it. He showed first that he was a 
poor man. This was easily done. Then he showed that on perfect 
levels, everything stood stagnant, and still. It neither run to you, nor 
rolled away. There was a fair set-off: no advantage there. That on 
hills, nothing run to you, but everything rolled away : there was less 
than no advantage; there was a positive disadvantage. He then show- 
ed that, at the base of a hill, every thing on that side, from the heights 
above, would run to you. Here was an advantage — this advantage 
was more than doubled, where the point selected was at the base of two 
hills on opposite sides, because the one acted as a check to the force of 
gravitation, imparted by the rapid descent of the other. But this was 
not all; at the point then selected concentrated all the advantages of 
three hills, it being walled in on every side, save one, which afforded an 
outlet for the refuse matter, which being once used, was no longer 
needed, but pushed off into the swamp. This was a plain case — the 
minor was proved. 



THOMAS COOPWOOD, OF MISSISSIPPI. 637 

The case then stood : The major admitted, the minor proved ; and 
the conclusion — followed — as a matter of course, the place where the 
timbers lay, was the place to build on. He had gained his point, his 
friends yielded. The house-raising went on, and the buildings were 
speedily erected. 

By means of troughs, properly arranged, he conducted the purest 
water, fresh, cold and clear, from the beautiful little spring that gushed 
out of the side of the hill above, as it rolled along within its wooden 
bed prepared for it, sparkling and gurgling to the very door of their 
cabin below. There it was to drink, to cook, to wash, to cool the 
butter and milk, and to put out fire in case of need. He cut his wood 
on the side or top of the hill, and it rolled right to the place where it 
was wanted. Here, with half the trouble, and double the convenience, 
he lived in more comfort than his neighbors, by making the laws of 
gravitation labor for, and subserve his interests, and minister to his 
wants. But was this location not sickly 1 asked one of his friends from a 
distance, who, when on a visit, was admiring the beauty and convenience 
of the improvements of the homestead. Sickness ! No : There was 
nothing there to make sickness out of. Every thing there was clean, 
neat, clear and bright, and cool and comfortable. But that swamp? 
But that swamp was east of the residence, and made it more healthy. 
It drained off every thing noxious, while the rays of the rising sun every 
morning called up all the effluvia and miasmatic vapor from the lagoons 
and low-grounds in the bottom below, in an opposite direction from the 
house. But still, the captain said when he got rich, he would build on 
the hills. And lest it should hereafter be forgotten, it may be as well 
here to remark that at the time when this account is being written his plan- 
tation covers over seven hills, and his dwelling stands in the centre, 
upon the most elevated of them all, with hundreds of acres of the rich- 
est soil, in a high state of cultivation, spread in the distance around. 

He was born in the vale of obscurity, his youth was beset with diffi- 
culties, and his building his first house in the humble hollow between 
the hills, was a fit emblematic memento of his then condition in life, as 
his present residence on the hill is and will be of the heights to which he 
has climbed. He commenced at the foot of the ladder, and if he has not 
reached the top, he has certainly climbed high, and reached an elevated 
position, which is heightened in comparison, when to remembrance is 
called the ponderous load he has carried on his journey. 

But to return. While living in the hollow, he cultivated his farm, 
and made money on the capital invested, until he engaged in the pro- 
duce trade, as a more speedy method of increasing his fortune, in which 
he accumulated rapidly, for a time, when all of a sudden there came a 
derangement in the money market, a crash in the business transactions 
of the country, and a panic ensued, while heavy purchases were on his 
hands, and the result was that it took all that he had to pay what he 
owed. But he paid it to the last cent, and without suit, as he believed 
it was better to sell his own property without costs, than to permit 
another to do it for him with costs, and at a sacrifice. 

Reduced to poverty again, with barely enough to subsist upon, Capt. 
Coopwood removed with his family to Lawrence county, Alabama, 
then a territory, where he settled in the woods, built cabins, and im- 



638 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

proved lands, and bought and sold as usual ; and in the course of a few 
years he had a good farm, well improved, and hands enough to work it. 
In the mean time, having pursued his studies as formerly, and at the 
same time mixing and mingling much among the people, always in the 
line of business, however, and being desirous to keep the law, and not 
to break it, he turned his attention to the science which embodied its 
principles. He read Blackstone's Commentaries, Chitty's Pleadings, 
Coke upon Littleton, Starkie on Evidence, and various other books, 
merely for information and improvement, without any intention at the 
time of ever commencing its practice as a profession. 

Having accumulated a competent property, and not being required, 
from the necessity of the case, longer to perform, in person, any portion 
of the labor of his farm, and being inspired with a laudable ambition, 
as well as patriotic motives to serve his country, he was induced, in the 
year 1824, to become a candidate to represent the county in which he 
lived, in the lower branch of the state legislature. He ran against the 
Hon. John White, a gentleman of fine talents, excellent qualifications, 
and high reputation, and was beaten by him, by a majority of about 
seventy votes. This only served to arouse his ambition, and he there- 
fore resolved to present himself to the people again. 

In 1825 he was again a candidate, and was elected by a large majority 
over all opposition. He served his first session, and made his first ex- 
periment as a legislator at Cahawba, then the seat of government of the 
state. Having mixed extensively with the people, he was one of them, 
knowing their wants, and understanding their interests, while, to a com- 
plete identity with them in their inclinations and wishes, he added 
talents for commanding and controlling the services of those with 
whom, in his new career, he was called upon to act, rarely equaled, if 
ever surpassed, by any. He served them, with their highest approba- 
tion of his course, six regular sessions in the House of Representatives, 
when he was promoted by the voice of the people, his former constitu- 
ents, to the Senate. As senator, he served them three regular annual 
sessions, and one called session, when, in 1836, he removed from the 
state, and took up his residence in the county of Monroe, in the State 
of Mississippi, where he is now living. 

It is not intended here to speak in lengthened narrative of the capacity 
of Capt. Coopwood as a legislator. To do so would be an unnecessary 
consumption of time and space. It is enough to say that he seldom 
failed to carry his point, in whatever respect he chose to present his 
views and preferences, to the body of which he was a member. Study- 
ing to be useful, he always informed himself of the wants and interests 
of his constituents ; and to subserve these, being the end in view, he 
always made the attack, or came to the rescue, prepared and fortified 
with the necessary support from above, below, around, to secure suc- 
cess in the undertaking. In the accomplishment of his purposes, he 
looked mainly to the adaptation of the means to be employed, to the 
ends to be attained; and as he selected them, so they served him. But 
the indorsement of his course, by the approbation of the people, who so 
long retained him in their service, and doubtless would have continued 
hira still longer, but for his removal from their midst, is the best 
eulogium which can be bestowed upon him as a faithful representative. 



THOMAS COOPWOOD, OF MISSISSIPPI. 639 

In 1830, while a member of the legislature, at the earnest persuasion 
of his friends, added to the frequent calls made upon him for legal ad- 
vice, Captain Coopwood applied for, and obtained a license to practise 
law, and opened an office in the town of Moulton, the seat of justice for 
Lawrence, the county which he represented. This, to him, was rather 
a change of scene, than the opening of another act in the great drama 
of life's onward current; for so long had he been a close observer of the 
apparent movements in the business transactions of the court-house 
pageantry, that there was but little for him to learn, save in what lay 
deep-hidden in the background, behind the front view of the scenery, 
obscured by the webbed intracacies of the science itself, having little or 
nothing to do with the modus operandi of the practice of the profession. 
A peep, however, behind the scenery, into the green-room preparations 
of the more distinguished actors, disclosed at once to the keen eye and 
penetrating vision of the captain, much of the valuable material benefi- 
cial to the service in which he had embarked, confusedly mixed, how- 
ever, with much more that was rather deleterious than productive of 
good : that the pure grains lay so scattered and intermingled with the mere 
dross and rubbish, that it was scarcely worth the labor to extract what 
was acquired in the gathering : that while all aspired to the honors and 
professed to wear them, but few performed the drudgery necessary to 
the accumulation of the treasure ; and that fewer still waved the magic 
wand that brought the unalloyed particles together in quantities appre- 
ciable to the popular gaze, or even to the vision of the judge himself, and 
that even these were, many times, meanly rewarded and poorly paid ; 
and therefore he now as before wisely determined to do as the world 
did in which he lived ; and not to be eccentric, where eccentricity did 
not pay well. So he bit his lip, held his tongue, exchanged a wink for 
a nod, seized upon, and appropriated whatever of the practical came 
within his reach, lightly skipped and passed over the abstruse, and 
discarded, in toto, all that could be classed in the category of the 
abstract. In short, he was at once, and almost by intuition, as he has 
been ever since, the bold, plain, direct, firm-minded, self-willed, practical 
lawyer. 

Discarding mere matters of form, he seized with rapidity, and held 
with a firm grasp, the substance of his client's cause ; and very philoso- 
phically concluding that the world would pass judgment that he was 
the best lawyer who gained the most cases, he brought all his energies 
and all his talents to the attainment of that end, without stopping to 
satisfy himself, whether the principles brought to bear were well estab- 
lished by precedent or not. And in this he has been generally success- 
ful. Few lawyers have ever enjoyed a larger run of business, in a 
country practice, under like circumstances, than he did, from the very 
commencement of his professional career to its termination. And fewer 
still have succeeded so well, with a like amount of other business 
matter pressing on their hands to claim their attention. 

In the argument of his cases, preferring the chances before the jury, 
on the merits of the facts and circumstances, under what he regards as 
the great principles of natural justice, to questions of technicality before 
the court, his habit has generally been to remain quiet until the evi- 
dence has closed, and then to seize the strong points presented by the 



640 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

testimony, and to throw them in a solid form, with the boldness of an 
unbounded confidence in the prevailing justice of his client's cause, right 
at the best guarded and most strongly fortified point of his adversary's 
ground of defence, or point of attack, and by main force, and the short- 
est and most direct route possible, take the field, and gain the victory, 
or lose the battle. Seeming always thoroughly to understand his case, 
his boldness has seldom failed to inspire his own side with confidence, 
while it intimidated the opposition, and has done much in aid of his suc- 
cess, and not unfrequently has it made to the mind of the jury the 
worse appear the better cause. As he has disregarded mere matters of 
form in pleading, so he has eschewed all attempt at ornameut in his 
style of speaking ; and with matters of substance before him, he 
has always progressed with the argument, from his premises to his 
conclusion, in the briefest possible time. His speeches at the bar have 
always been, as elsewhere, remarkable for their pith, point, force and 
brevity. 

In the examination of witnesses his manner has been modest, mild, 
courteous, and kind ; or bold, bluff, dogmatical, and severe, as the occa- 
sion seemed to require, according to the behavior of the party testify- 
ing ; always shaping his questions according to the emergency, to elicit 
the answers desired to sustain whichever side of the issue joined he might 
chance to occupy ; and when the testimony has once been detailed, he 
has always recollected it with remarkable accuracy. 

Generous and kind in his disposition, courteous and urbane in his de- 
portment, with much of the '■'■ suaviter in modo et fortiter in re," he has 
ever been pleasant and agreeable in his intercourse with both the bench 
and the bar, except on occasions when persuaded in his own mind that 
intended wrong was about to be perpetrated, and then he has been re- 
markable for the facility with which he could change the even-flowing 
current into boisterous and angry waves, overriding by storm whatever 
barriers presented themselves in his way. 

To the younger members of the profession he has always been ready 
to lend countenance, afford encouragement, and give assistance to their 
efforts, and advance their prospects in their professional career. 

His wife died in 1832. While a member of the Senate, and engaged 
in the practice of the law, he embarked to some extent in the land specu- 
lation then opening in North Mississippi, and examined much of the 
Chickasaw cession, in which he became involved, with nine others, and 
bound for one hundred and fifteen thousand, three hundred and sixty 
dollars. All of his co-operators and co-obligors in this transaction, but 
one, failed, which left the heaviest responsibility upon him ; but every 
dollar has been paid, besides something upward of fifty thousand more 
for various friends, in consequence of his indorsement of paper for their 
accommodation. And with all these liabilities hanging over him, while 
almost every one much indebted was breaking and hiding out his pro- 
perty, his " goods and chattels, lands and tenements," were all standing 
there, fair to view, reachable, and sometimes reached by execution, but 
never sold. In these financial difficulties he sometimes had to take the 
benefit of such stays and delays as the regular and often lengthened 
course of the law allowed him, but it was always with the boast that, un- 
til every dollar for which he was liable was paid, the last dime's worth 



THOMAS COOPWOOD, OP MISSISSIPPI. 641 

of his property should remain without cloud over his title, subject to 
the payment thereof. He is now worth, at a fair valuation, clear of all 
liabilities, about fifty thousand dollars. 

In 1836, having lived about four years a widower, since the death of 
his wife, he again determined to marry, and led to the altar Miss 
Minerva, the daughter of Dr. John Ellis, a native of Virginia, who had, 
years before, emigrated with his family, and settled in Lawrence county, 
Alabama. He immediately afterward removed to Aberdeen, in Mon- 
roe county, as above stated, where, the following year, he resumed the 
practice of his profession, with renewed ardor and his usual success, in 
which he has been engaged, pretty generally, ever since, until, in 1850, 
he announced his determination to abandon the practice and retire from 
the bar ; since which time he has taken little or no new business, and 
now only appears in such of the old and complicated cases in which he 
had been retained as still linger upon the docket. 

Within the last year he has sold his town residence and his plantation 
in the prairies, and purchased land, and moved his negroes as well as his 
white family to it in the hills, where he now resides, for the sake of the 
calm retirement it affords from the noise and bustle of a town life, and 
the active business pursuits which he has so long been accustomed to. 
But ere he had done so, and while he was making his preparations for 
that purpose, he received the nomination from the Union party, in 1851, 
for a seat in the lower branch of the state legislature, and was prevailed 
on to accept the appointment and run for the station, as a means to- 
wards securing, amongst other important measures, a charter for the 
great New-Orleans and Nashville Rail-road running through the town 
of Aberdeen. 

He was elected by a large majority, and was warmly solicited and 
pressingly urged by his friends, both before and after his arrival at 
Jackson, in consideration of his long and tried experience in matters 
pertaining to legislation, and his known familiarity with parliamentary 
rules and usages, to accept the speaker's chair ; but he firmly declined 
the proffered honors of the station, upon the ground that he could better 
promote the immediate interests of his constituents by occupying a place 
on the floor ; besides that, it would be more congenial to his feelings and 
wishes to be ready and at liberty at all times to participate in the de- 
bates as they might arise on the various subjects presented. In this, as 
in most other things, he had his own way, and made one of the most 
attentive, active, laborious, and useful members of the last session, and 
succeeded, by good management, in obtaining a charter for the road iu 
question in conformity with the wishes of his constituents, and in doing 
as much, and even more, in other respects, to meet their approbation, 
than was expected under all the circumstances. 

A whig in principle, he was untrammeled by party shackels, support- 
ing whatever his judgment approved, and opposing all that he regarded 
as objectionable. Bold and independent in the discharge of the duties 
assigned him as representative from the county of Monroe, as he had 
ever been when representing a different county in another state, he fear- 
lessly grappled with whoever and whatever assailed him, or in anywise 
impeded his progress in the just vindication and proper support of the 
rights of his constituents. It remains to be seen whether they will ap- 

41 



642 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

prove his course, and reward his labors with the same high appreciation 
that had been awarded to his efforts during his previous legislative 
career. 

It must not be forgotten that the whig central convention for that 
year nominated him, and run his name for governor of the State of Mis- 
sissippi in 1845. Of course he was not elected, for at that time the de- 
mocratic party was largely in the ascendency throughout the state ; and 
besides he never left his home on an electioneering expedition, nor took 
any active part in the matter, one way or the other, during the canvass. 
He did not even formally accept the nomination, and neither sought nor 
desired the position. It has never been the absorbing and predomina- 
ting desire of his heart to acquire political distinction, and judicial sta- 
tions he has never sought. 

Captain Coopwood is about five feet ten inches high, well set, broad 
shoulders, full chest, and of full, round, fleshy proportions, but by no 
means corpulent. He has a large, well-proportioned head, measuring 
well in every direction, and particularly so in the basilar region, with 
originally dark hair, bordering on black, but now quite bald, and slightly 
gray. His eyes are of a dark-blue color, rather small, but full of ani- 
mal vigor; large, full, round face, high, prominent cheek-bones, full 
and elevated forehead. 

He is a true believer in all the proprieties and precepts of the Chris- 
tian religion, but not in the remotest degree tinctured with fanaticism. 
If he does not always tread the narrow path, walking in the command- 
ments, keeping them blameless, it is because to err is human, and he 
knows that io forgive is divine. 

He is warm, cordial, and kind to his friends, and severe, harsh, and 
bitter towards his enemies. 

He has strong family predilections and attachment to wife and chil- 
dren, with the principle of " self, me and mine^'' greatly predominating 
in his organization ; he makes a kind master, good neighbor, with much 
benevolence to the poor ; and what is remarkable for one organized as 
he is, whose life has been one continued struggle for property, under 
adverse circumstances, he spends his money freely and liberally. 

Now in his fifty-ninth year, the captain is as full of energy, activity, 
life and vigor, as a boy of twenty; and is one of the most companion- 
able men alive. To hear him talk, and see his movements, on a long, 
tedious, dull, traveling journey, far away from home, is to be, in spite 
of his thinned locks and bald head, almost half convinced that his iron 
frame and elastic spirits will never wear out nor fail him ; but that his 
primal manhood is traveling round in circles, and he is to live and re- 
live his whole life over and over again. 

In this brief sketch, if the leading, prominent traits of a well-formed 
character, through a long, busy, checkered, and most active career, have 
been sufficiently marked out to bring to the mind of the reader the 
faint and general resemblance in outline-picture of the genuine arche- 
type, there will be found, doubtless, much to condemn, but much to 
admire and to imitate — there will be found patterns for the youth in ad- 
versity, who has the mind to comprehend what is around and above 
him, and the will to direct his course through the one up to the other, 
determined on his way to reap the reward of his labor in the transit — 



THOMAS COOPWOOD, OF MISSI8SIPPL C43 

there will be found models for the man of the world, who lives not in 
the studied creations of his own genius, but who seizes upon whatever 
he finds already created and prepared for the purpose by the heads and 
the hands of others, and reduces it to practice and appropriates it to his 
own use, as well as to the benefit of tlie millions moving along life's 
great thoroughfare in company with him — there will be found much for 
the study and imitation of him, who, born under the presiding influence of 
a more propitious star than he, has made, amid the storms that raged, 
shipwreck of his fortune, but who desires to rise again, and is will- 
ing to exert his energies to do so — there will be found advice for 
the poor, seeking wealth ; example for the obscure, aiming at distinc- 
tion ; lessons for the ignorant, in the pursuit of wisdom, and counsel 
for the wise, who desire to be useful. Whether at this point of time 
he is viewed away in the background lying in the distance, as the mere 
child, feeding his father's cattle, and trading with the Indians for bread; 
toiling on the farm through "summer's heat and winter's cold" for the 
support of his sisters and younger brothers ; cutting cord- wood at the 
iron-works to purchase his mother a farm — or, as the youth, fighting in 
defence of his country ; on the stump, making his first speech to his 
comrades in support of his own promotion — or, as the man, building 
his house in the hollow of the hills to suit the convenience of his 
family ; trading in produce and losing his property ; or, in the woods, 
taking a new start in a new country ; or, in the more prominent, but not 
more laudable, position in the councils of his country, making laws for 
the government of the people, or playing the lawyer before the tribu- 
nals created for the administration of the laws, in the dispensation of 
justice ; or, trading in lands, walking in, or working out of embarrassing 
moneyed difficulties — in all — through all, the character of the man pre- 
sents a rich theme — a curious and interesting problem — for the con- 
templation and solution of the mental and moral philosopher. 

It is not pretended that he has no faults. It would be hard labor — 
a dry, dull and monotonous task, indeed, to sketch the life of one, whose 
character was composed, entire, of one straightforward, even, smooth cur- 
rent of uninterrupted good, with no relief, in light or shade, of compara- 
tive or superlative degree, to enliven and animate the picture. The 
writer would loathe the task, though he might love and attempt to copy 
the virtues of the original. Faults are magnified and objected to main- 
ly by those having much greater ones, and committing, in consequence, 
much more heinous enormities — but faults, to the philosophic mind, are 
not objectionable ; for in man it is true, and the principle runs through 
all nature, that the capacity for evil must exist in oraer to the accom- 
plishment of good. Man's conduct does not always square with his 
sentiments. In conduct, Julian developed the virtues of a Christian, 
Constantine the vices of a pagan. But the sentiments of Julian led 
back thousands to paganism, and those of Constantine, under Heaven's 
rule, helped to bow to Christianity the nations of the earth. In con- 
duct, the humblest votary to the service of Leo, who believed in the 
miraculous efficacy, in the cure of souls, of the indulgencics sold by 
Tetzel, may have been a better man than Luther. To the sentiments 
of Luther, however, the mind of Christendom is indebted for the grand- 
est revolution the world has ever known. 

The writer is no eulogist, but he would, when called upon to decide, 



644 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

sit equipoised in the judgment-seat, and simply, and independently of 
friends and foes, the living and the dead, "render unto Csesar the things 
that are Caesar's." This is believed to be the true object of history ; 
and in this alone can it be properly said that it is "philosophy teach- 
ing by example." The writer is well aware of the difficulties that con- 
front the historian at every step of his progress, in attempting to trans- 
fer to paper by the use of language the exact picture of the character 
to be drawn. To the mere sketch-writer, perhaps, the difficulties are 
in nowise diminished. And it has been well said by one, on whose ca- 
pacity to decide the world has long since passed judgment, that " in every 
human character and transaction there is a mixture of good and evil ; — 
a little exaggeration, a little suppression, a judicious use of epithets, a 
watching and searching skepticism with respect to the evidence on one 
side, a convenient credulity with respect to every report or tradition on 
the other, may easily make a saint of Laud, or a tyrant of Henry the 
Fourth." In the pages before the reader, the writer has endeavored to 
keep his pen on the exact line in the equi-distance between the two ex- 
tremes. How far he has succeeded, in this respect, must now be left 
for others to determine. 




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JOSHDA B. BOWLES, OF KENTUCKY. 645 

JOSHUA B. BOWLES, 

OF LOUISVILLE, KENTUCKY, PRESIDENT OF THE BANK OF LOUISVILLE. 

Joshua B. Bowles was born in Albemarle county, Virginia, 1795. 
The circumstances of his father preventing a more liberal education, he 
obtained such a one as was usually afforded by those country schools 
at that early period of our history whose highest range of studies would 
scarcely comprise the initiatory course of the present. Here he was 
distinguished by the rapid progress which he made in his studies, and 
his quick apprehension. Such was the love and admiration engendered 
in the heart of his preceptor toward his pupil, that a few years since he 
came many miles to see him, though far advanced in years, and gloried 
in the realization of the prophecy which he had made, while his tutor, 
that " Joshua would make for himself a name if he lived." At an early 
age he accompanied his father, who was of a roving disposition, on an 
excursion "to the west," then, as now, the "cynosure of neighboring 
eyes." After many wanderings and hair-breadth escapes, they arrived 
in 1814, in Charlestown, Indiana. His father's habits having become 
unsatisfactory to the son, called forth many filial expostulations from 
him; but finding these unavailing, and that a longer stay could not 
benefit the former, and would be detrimental to his own interests, he 
determined to leave him, though his heart still glowed with the warm- 
est filial instincts. Nor has he ever failed in all the duties incumbent 
upon him as son or relative. And now, without a friend to advise him, 
and with no patrimony but a sound intellect, which was his by birth- 
right, and high moral principles which he had early imbibed, together 
with a firm dependence on the Supreme Giver of all Good, we behold 
him at the early age of eighteen fully accoutred for the warfare which 
the combatant on life's busy field of action must ever wage when in 
pursuit of an object unattainable, unless he resolve at the onset that no 
obstacles shall overcome his exertions, no impediments be deemed in- 
surmountable, the word " I can't" be erased from his vocabulary, and 
his watchword be ever " onward." A company of rangers, who were 
sent out by the general government, destined for the western frontier 
of the then territory of Indiana, having at this time arrived in Charles- 
town, he accepted the invitation of -the captain to accompany him as 
trader at the post. These were troublous times indeed, when the bor- 
der warfare was carried on with the most unrelenting cruelty by the 
untutored savages on the one hand, and on the other by passions scarce- 
ly less malignant by the boasted civilized white man. Life and prop- 
erty had become so insecure, that many of these companies were sent 
out to protect the inhabitants of these thinly populated regions. They 
were allowed to establish trading houses for the supply of the wants of 
the soldiery and friendly Indians in the vicinity. On their arrival at 
the place of rendezvous, our young friend lost no time in getting to 
business. His little store was soon opened, and the Delawares and 
other tribes amicably disposed brought their furs and peltries, and in 
return received such goods as they could procure of him, and the sol- 



646 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

diers were credited until tiieir service money became due. This was 
an important office for a youth to perform, as much responsibility de- 
volved upon him. It required strict attention to duties and a discrimi- 
nating judgment, to know whom to trust, and how far to extend credit 
to so reckless and prodigal a class as those he was now dealing with. 
But he happily accomplished what he had undertaken, and at the ex- 
piration of the term, found himself fully prepared to settle up accounts 
to the satisfaction of all concerned. (3n his return to Charlestown, he 
found that his father had joined the army during his absence. For a 
small salary he became clerk and salesman for Judge Shelby, of that 
place, who, in addition to his office of judge, added those of tavern- 
keeper and dry-goods merchant. But he soon found their united exer- 
tions did not prove very profitable; and at the end of two years he re- 
solved on seeking a larger sphere of action. In pursuance of this object 
he came to Louisville, Kentucky, in the month of January, 181G. The 
beautiful city of that name which now stands unequaled by any city in 
the valley of the Ohio -or Mississippi for the salubriousness of its cli- 
mate, the beauty of its situation and the unparalleled commercial ad- 
vantages which she possesses, as being at the head of navigation for 
boats of largest class, was at that time retarded in its progress by its 
unhealthfulness. Situated in the midst of swamps and marshes whose 
poisonous miasms and pestilental exhalations, under the form of ty- 
phoid and bilious fevers, sent their scores of victims to the grave, it re- 
quired some degree of courage to take up a residence there permanently. 
But with that penetration for which he has ever been distinguished, he 
foresaw its future importance, and at once determined to locate himself 
there, trusting to his habits of temperance and cautiousness in diet to 
ward off the fell destroyers. Yes, Death had indeed entered the field, 
and was reaping a rich harvest among the dying, and binding the cords 
of sorrow around the hearts of the living; and one of weaker nerve 
and purpose might have faltered at the threshold, but his decision had 
been made ; and then at the outset, as well as at all subsequent periods 
of his active life, when his judgment has fully confirmed what reason 
dictated as the course proper to be pursued, he has ever followed it 
with unswerving steadfastness. Now, we well know that this principle 
may be much abused, and under the form of decision of character, an 
obstinate blind adherence to preconceived opinions, founded on a false 
basis, may be the cause of much evil in the world ; but much the same 
mode of reasoning may be applied to all the attributes of greatness 
when they are possessed by those who have not, as their results prove, 
a well-regulated mind. But to resume. Not one familiar face greeted 
him. A stranger un-knowing and unknown, he walked the streets of 
the dismal city from " morn to dewy eve," endeavouring to find em- 
ployment. But did he falter? No. The bright star of hope was 
ever in the ascendant, and whispering him words of comfort and cheer, 
that the industrious and persevering would always find their eflforts 
crowned with success in the end. Wearied at length of this means of 
attaining that end, he walked into a hotel, kept by a Major Taylor, and 
presented himself before him. After some questions and answers had 
been passed between them, " My business will not warrant me in taking 
you, sir," said the host, "as I could not aflford to pay you anything." 



JOSHUA B. BOWLES, OF KENTUCKY. 64 Y 

" I want no pay, sir," was the prompt reply of the indomitable suitor, 
*'and I will stay a few days with you anyhow." The old major, gaz- 
ing upon that open, manly brow, which it needed not the skill of a pro- 
fessed physiognomist to determine was the index of an honest heart, 
smiled his assent to this proposition. Now, we might suppose, on a 
superficial view, that these conditions were not very favorable to our 
young friend, but he soon commenced operations on such a scale as to 
show that he was fully competent to any emergency. " Mine host," 
a merry, jovial soul, who took no thought for the morrow, was one of 
those who, after spending a fortune in pursuit of pleasure while young, 
are forced in old age to resort to some means for obtaining a support. 
He had hailed from the Old Dominion many years before, with the 
wreck of his possessions, accompanied by his wife, who was as thriftless 
as himself He had a kindly greeting for all who patronized him, and 
provided they could tell a good story and produce merry peals of laugh- 
ter, their accounts were not very strictly scrutinized. But a change 
soon became apparent in every department, and order was brought out 
of chaos by the vigilance of our young friend. He soon found himself 
at the head of affairs. No part escaped his ever watchful eye. From 
the highest to the lowest offices of the establishment, he was ever ready 
to lend a helping hand or exert a salutary supervision. The books, 
too, were overhauled. Accounts which had grown mouldy with age 
were brushed up and presented for payment to the astonished creditors, 
who had fondly hoped they had taken " that sleep from which there is 
no waking." Moneys, too, lent in by-gone years, and which had long 
since ceased to live in the memory department of the good-natured 
proprietor, or who had, from his want of courage to enforce his de- 
mands, yielded their claims to his sympathy, were exhumed from their 
burial-place, and stared once more in living characters before the 
visions of those who had thus taken advantage of the easy tempera- 
ment of their creditor. Among many others who were witnesses of 
the revolution effected by him in the aflfairs of the major, was James 
McCrum, a highly respectable hardware merchant of the place and 
boarded at the hotel. He was struck with this admirable conduct of 
our young friend, and showed the interest with which he regarded him 
by giving him the hand of friendship, and by many of those little acts 
of courtesy which too many of those who are immersed in business and 
enveloped in its mazy folds, fail to bestow, but which when freely prof- 
fered bind together with blessed links the brotherhood of mankind. 
And here, might it not be deemed flattery to eulogize the living, we 
might be tempted to say much in commendation of this gentleman, 
who, prompted by the generous impulses of a truly noble soul, showed 
so deep an interest in the welfare of this youth, and recognized, in this 
indefatigable industry and untiring efforts in the performance of his 
duties, the germs of a comprehensive mind and that business tact so 
eminently developed in after years. 

With what satisfaction must this gentleman, now declining in the 
vale of life, look back to that period when he cheered our young friend 
onward in the course he was pursuing, and tendered him that friendship 
and confidence which the lapse of many years has but tended to cement 
more firmly ! We can scarcely appreciate to its full extent the in- 



648 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

fluence which it is in the power of those to exert, who, having them- 
selves escaped the shoals and quicksands which beset their path in 
youth, find that they are safely harbored in the stream of the wise 
and good of the community in which they dwell. These are beacons 
standing aloft on the coast-ways of existence, cheering by their light 
the inexperienced navigator, who spreads his canvas to the breeze, de- 
termined to secure a like safe anchorage ; or a warning to others to es- 
cape the fatal Scylla and Chary bdis which they so happily escaped, but 
in whose vortex so many " youth of promise fair" have been decoyed 
to their irretrievable ruin. Four months had scarcely elapsed since our 
young friend's arrival at the hotel, when Mr. McCrum offered him a 
situation as salesman in his store. To this with pleasure he consented, 
notwithstanding the entreaties and expostulations of the major and his 
wife, who, finding these unavailing, resorted to tears and every induce- 
ment which they could offer to change his determination. But he had 
decided ; and in a few days we find him " at home" in his new vocation, 
more than fulfilling the expectations of his employer. The same habits 
which had marked his previous course were still pursued. Early in 
the morning, while the city appeared buried in slumber, he might have 
been seen putting everything in the neatest order, placing his wares in 
the most favorable position for the attraction of customers, and making 
arrangements for the business of the day. In after life, be has frequently 
been heard to say, "My success in business I attribute mainly to this 
habit of early rising. After I commenced the wholesale dry -goods bu- 
siness especially, it was of the greatest importance to be up and on the 
look-out for strangers, who generally rise early to view the localities, 
&c. Often have I, while in their slippers — their boots undergoing the 
process of blacking — introduced myself to them while standing in my 
door, as they walked the pavement in front of the hotel near which my 
store was situated. Such a one, after the morning's salutation, I 
would ask to walk in, view my goods, &c. After breakfast, being 
booted and ready for making purchases, he calls again ; I sell him, per- 
haps, several boxes of goods, the seller's name being marked on one 
corner. He goes home ; the name attracts the attention of other mer- 
chants in the vicinity. Through him they are introduced to the whole- 
sale dealer, and thus I have acquired the trade of whole villages. 

Mr. McCrum left home a few months after Mr. Bowles' engagement 
with him, and entrusted the latter with the sole direction and guidance 
of his business concerns during his absence. The responsibility thus 
devolved upon Mr. B. was great. But his untiring exertions, both 
mental and physical, kept pace with the occasions that called them 
forth ; and, on Mr. McCrum's return, after an absence of three or four 
months, he so well appreciated the manner in which his affairs had been 
managed, that he proffered him a stock of hardware to commence busi- 
ness on his own account. Deeply grateful for such disinterested mani- 
festation of friendship, Mr. Bowles accepted the proposition ; but con- 
cluded, before putting it into execution, that he would visit his relatives 
in Virginia, as he had not seen them since leaving there in childhood. 
With a few hundred dollars which he had saved from his salaries, he left 
■Louisville for that purpose, and spent two months in the delightful endear- 
ments of home, to which he had so long been a stranger. He returned iu 



JOSHUA B. BOWLES, OF KENTUCKT. 649 

the fall of 18 — . Mr. McCrum, -whose health had been precarious for some 
time past, and who wished to settle up accounts abroad, collect debts, 
&c., now offered Mr. Bowles, on his return from Virginia, the entire 
stock of merchandise, together with the stand which he then occupied. 
The purchase was made ; credit to extend from three to fifteen months. 
Success crowned his efforts ; and he was enabled to make a payment of 
seven thousand dollars, within the first twelve months. At this time 
the difficulties in the financial world were almost unprecedented. The 
wars which had so long desolated Europe had tended to banish gold 
and silver as a medium of exchange. The ordinary channels of com- 
merce had been dried up. Not only those who had sowed the wind 
now reaped the whirlwind, but its ruinous consequences were felt by 
the whole civilized world. The inflated paper currency, which had ac- 
cumulated to an enormous extent, was now reduced to its nominal 
value. With the return of peace commerce revived, and the metallic 
basis attained its lawful place in the monetary world. Europe, blessed 
with the genial sunshine of peace, endeavored by the pursuits of active 
industry to make reparation for the long night of darkness which it had 
been her melancholv lot to endure. ThinjTs were now tending to an 

V DO 

equilibrium. Our commodities which had attained a false value sank 
to their real value. Bankruptcy and ruin were the inevitable result. 
Relief measures were projected by the legislature of the state. That 
of Kentucky established forty-two independent banks, without a specie 
basis or safeguards to protect the community from the disastrous effects 
of a redundant paper currency ; the object being to enable the debtor 
to pay his debts, the creditor being obliged to receive this irredeemable 
paper in payment for those contracted. The legislature followed up their 
mistaken system of relief by various successive laws. Replevin, valuation 
and stay laws were enacted, but all to no purpose. In the moral as 
well as the physical world, where there is a radical error, it must be ex- 
punged ere the disease can be eradicated. The bubble soon exploded, 
and those who had foreseen how this state of things must terminate, 
and had taken advantage of their more sapient neighbors, by specula, 
tion in lands, &c., now urged their claims on their hapless victims. To 
meet their views the replevin law was extended. Then the Bank of 
the Commonwealth was chartered. The first issues of its notes were at 
a discount of 10 per cent., and soon went down to 50 per cent., for se- 
veral years ranging from 45 to 60 per cent. The pressure was over- 
whelming. It seemed as though the barriers which society has inter- 
posed for the good of all were about to be overleaped. The better 
feelings of the moral part of the community prevailed, however, and 
parties became divided under the names of Relief and Anti-relief parties. 
These were afterwards merged into the New and Old Court parties, and 
these, for several years, continued to convulse the body corporate to a de- 
gree which we of the present can scarcely realize, living, as we do, at an 
era when our moneyed institutions are the pride and boast of the sons of 
Kentucky, their structures being reared on so solid a basis, that not all 
the sad calamities which have Ijefallen the monetary concerns of the 
country in later days have been able to prostrate her credit in the com- 
mercial world. 

In 1825 the moral sentiment had undergone so decided a change for the 



650 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

better, that the obnoxious measures were repealed. The eminent judges 
who had been displaced by the dominant party of former years for their 
strict adhesion to constitutional restrictions, were now replaced by a 
large majority in the legislature. 

We have thus given a hasty sketch of this period in our earlier his- 
tory — " times indeed which tried men's souls, and showed what spirits 
they were of." Those men particularly who were engaged in mercan- 
tile pursuits, felt more sensibly than others each throb that agitated the 
public pulse ; and they who passed this fiery ordeal unscathed certain- 
ly " acted well their part." The temptation to speculate with funds so 
easily obtained, had been so great, that the ordinary process of accu- 
mulating property by slow and industrial pursuits, were abandoned as 
too dull and tedious. The fruits of these ruinous proceedings were now 
to be reaped, and the harvest of misery and woe which resulted we will 
not pause to contemplate. 

Mr. Bowles, whose habits of close observation and just appreciation 
of men and things well qualified him to grapple with the times, saw the 
great upheaving of the storm which he had anticipated undismay- 
ed, and by prompt decision, strict adherence to fixed principles, and a 
judgment almost unerring in these matters, was enabled to maintain 
his position amid the convulsive throes which agitated the body politic. 
These qualifications enabled him to analyze the character of the 
elements at work around him, and to stem the torrent as it approached. 
His maxim had ever been to " mind his own business," and though we 
might suppose this homely phrase almost obsolete in these days, yet its 
application is as useful now as it then was. Though he might have 
amassed a fortune more readily, had he followed the general impulse, 
and speculated in lands, &e., at this time, yet he preferred the more 
certain path to its acquirement by a strict attention to the daily routine 
of duties. 

The man who adopts this as his line of conduct will more assuredly 
achieve a triumph than he whose mind is distracted by every fluctuating 
breeze. But though not swayed from his pursuits as a merchant by 
the excitements of the day, yet has Mr. Bowles always considered it 
his duty as a good citizen to array himself on the side of order, and 
give whatever influence he might possess to its preservation. He has 
always been conservative in his views, and consequently was one of 
the old court party during those struggles between the advocates of 
order and demagogism. 

We portrayed the unsettled state of things during the first years of 
his commercial life, to show under what difficulties he labored, yet he 
safely steered his course amid the contending elements, and by pru- 
dence averted the storm. Writing to his brother, who had emigrated 
to Tennessee, and was called by the public voice to become a candidate 
for the legislature of that state, *' Never," said he, " seek public 
offices which are opposed to your interests as a merchant. Leave them 
to those who have nothing to interfere, and distract their attentions from 
such pursuits. Your vocation as a merchant is incompatible with that 
of a politician, and if you wish to pursue it successfully, give it your 
exclusive attention. Whether you succeed or not in your efforts, the 
confidence of the community in you as a merchant, which has hitherto 



JOSHUA B, BOWLES, OF KENTUCKY. 651 

•8Q weJi sustained you, will be impaired. I like the maxim, 'Coblers, 
stick to your last.' " The brother did not listen to these wise counsels, 
was elected, and the result predicted was too soon verified. 

The spring of 1825 found Mr. Bowles in a condition to enlarge his 
business, and he accordingly opened a wholesale dry-goods house.. 
Prior to this, however, his thoughts had been turned into another chan- 
nel. In his efforts to obtain an independence, he had remained imper- 
vious to the attractions of the gentler sex. But there are moments 
when perchance the citadel of the heart is not so strongly fortified as at 
others. At any rate, who that has arrived to years of maturity, can say 
that he has never been subject to the sway of woman 1 It is curious 
how Cupid will wedge himself into the recesses of the human heart. As 
his arrow penetrates that fortress, the stern warrior becomes as docile 
as a child, and is disarmed of his prowess. The statesman, on " whose 
nod hung the destiny of nations," becomes the humble suppliant. The 
orator, who holds entranced the multitude, is struck dumb. The poet, 
who luxuriates in the ideal ; the practical man, who scorns the theorist, 
and laughs at the dreams of the poet, all, each in turn, succumb at the 
summons of this little despot. 

The lady to whom our hero's heart yielded, was Mary, daughter of 
Richard, and niece of General Winchester, whose military deeds, during 
the late war with Great Britain, in defence of his country, has caused 
his name to be enrolled in its historical annals. Endowed by nature 
with the rarest beauty, combined with a sound intellect and amiable 
disposition, this lady was calculated not only to capture but to retain 
possession, and he now looked forward to days of prolonged happiness 
with her to whom he was united. On the foreground nought is per- 
ceptible on the glowing canvas — love has woven but scenes of calm 
domestic enjoyment, varied by the beauteous tints reflected from the 
lustrous eyes of the cherub infant encircled by its mother's arms. But 
veiled from sight, the background — could we but penetrate the dismal 
gloom which hides it from our vision — would present a far different as- 
pect. There stands the stern destroyer of all human hopes contem- 
plating this scene of ^nnubial felicity. Already the fatal aim is taken. 
Will he not relent ? Ah, no ! that arrow may not miss its aim. The 
grim archer, " steady to his purpose," feels not remorse. The groans 
of the agonized husband, the prayers and tears of dearest relatives, are 
alike ineffectual. He who gave has seen best in his wisdom to take 
away the idol, for on his altar alone would he have us sacrifice our 
affections. Afflictions affect us in various ways. Some sink under the 
infliction of such chastisements, and suffer unavailing regrets to sap the 
currents of blessings still left them. Others, too forgetful of the sacred 
recollections entwined around the past, suffer the tomb to obliterate all 
traces of their existence, and hasten to utter fresh vows of love to 
another. Not thus with Mr. Bowles. Though the axe was laid to the 
root of his heart's tendrils, yet he struggled for that resignation to the 
Divine will which can alone soothe the troubled spirit. In after life he 
has been called upon to endure repeated bereavements by death. Many 
children successively has it been his hard fate to follow to the grave ; and 
though nature will exact her tribute, and the seared heart recoil from 
contact with the world at such times, yet has he been enabled, by 



652 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

•the goodness of God, to fulfil the duties incumbent upon him in active 
life. The many years of retirement from scenes of gayety attested the 
sincerity of the grief which the bereavement referred to above laid 
upon him, though to the careless observer he might, have appeared 
entirely engrossed in his business. 

We have referred above to the triumph of the Old Court party in 
1826. After so desperate a struggle it required some time for the fer- 
mentation to subside, but amid the inextricable confusion of such a 
crisis, Mr. Bowles' business continued steadily to increase far beyond 
his anticipations. 

From 1828 to 1832, the great contest of state politics became merged 
in one of a more national character. The Old Court party, who had as- 
sumed the more appropriate title of National Republicans, and to which 
Mr. B. belonged, were now at issue with their old opponents, and the 
name of Harry Clay was the rallying signal around which the hopes of 
the patriot, wliether merchant, artisan, or those of professional character, 
clustered. Harry Clay ! Kentucky's noblest son ! — who can write, who 
can read that name, without feeling the blood quicken every pulsation 
as it vibrates through the veins 1 Let us pause to contemplate this era, 
for time itself seems identified with the name of him who was the em- 
bodiment of all excellence. The elections of '31, in which Clay was 
elected to the Senate of the United States, proved that the foul calum- 
nies with which his enemies had endeavored to blacken his fair fame, 
had not impaired the confidence which his fellow-citizens and those of 
the state at large reposed in him. The almost unparalleled love and ad- 
miration with which those of his own state regarded him, are among the 
brightest jewels that adorn his character ; and throughout his long public 
career they never wavered in their attachment, freely confiding the inter- 
ests of the state into his hands. In '32 the great question, whether the 
talents of the eminent civilian could outweigh the military deeds of the 
hero of the sword, was to be decided. Fierce was the combat. But the 
dire slanders which the envenomed shafts of the enemy had sped with ma- 
licious zeal from one end of the confederacy to the other had done 
their bidding, and the latter was triumphant. A train of evil con- 
sequences, " the end of which is not yet," we fear,*were the result. But 
it is not our business to trace these. Local considerations demand 
our time and attention. In 1829 Mr. Bowles had married Grace, daugh- 
ter of Thomas Shreve, a Quaker gentleman, who, in connection with 
his two brothers, had long occupied a conspicuous place as merchant in 
Alexandria, District of Columbia. The war of 1812 had numbered him 
among its many mercantile victims ; and a large cotton fiictory, in 
which much of his capital had been invested, becoming unproductive, 
completed his ruin. He first removed to Trenton, New-Jersey, but, 
finding matters growing worse, he concluded to emigrate to Cincinnati, 
where, within two years from their arrival, the nuptials above referred 
to took place. Thomas H. Shreve, author of " Drayton" and many 
other publications in the diflferent periodicals which emanated from the 
press some years ago, and of late years one of the principal editors of 
the Louisville Journal, which is well known throughout the Union for 
the ability and talent displayed in its editorials, is brother to this lady. 
We resume our narrative. The replevin laws having been repealed, and 



JOSHUA B. BOWLES, OF KENTUCKY. 663 

the paper of the Bank of the Commonwealth having been burned by 
legislative authority, the dawning of a brighter day appeared. Thus re- 
assured, business had resumed its wonted activity, and confidence was 
restored. But the election of '32 had caused another reaction. A. bank 
of the United States at Louisville, and another at Lexington, had taken 
the places of those formerly in use. The dominant party, whose object 
it was to ruin the Bank of the United States, that they might, in its 
stead, form a multiplicity of those institutions, subservient to their own 
purposes, now carried their plans into execution with remorseless hands. 
The states had no alternative but to establish local banks. In '32, Mr. 
Bowles was active, with many other leading men of the city, in obtain- 
ing a charter from the legislature for the establishment of the Bank of 
Louisville. This was granted, and the bank went into operation with 
a capital of $3,000,000. Mr. Bowles was chosen one of its directors at 
its commencement, and continued in that capacity until 1840, when he 
was elected president, which oflice he still continues to hold. The legis- 
lature, at the session of 1834, granted charters for the establishment of 
the Bank of Kentucky, and the Northern Bank, in 1835. No institu- 
tions of the kind in the Union have maintained a more honorable stand- 
ing than these banks throughout the disastrous periods through which it 
has been their lot to pass. 

In 1837 the troubles consequent upon the destruction of the National 
Bank, causing an enormous multiplication of others in its stead, had 
reached their climax. The salutary check which it had imposed on the 
local banks was then withdrawn, and the country had become inundated 
with paper currency. This had produced its legitimate fruits. Past ex- 
perience was no obstacle to the speculating spirit which again pervaded 
all classes. The nominal value which had been attached to commodi- 
ties was now reduced to its proper standard. Heavy debts had accu- 
mulated, and the creditor was unwilling to be reimbursed with the spu- 
rious currency. At this crisis the legislature of Kentucky legalized the 
suspension of the banks, not requiring them to resume specie payments. 
This act of forbearance was justly appreciated by the managers, who, 
by their ability and strenuous exertions, resumed their liabilities after 
the lapse of little more than a year. But this was only a short interval 
of peace which preceded the second suspension. A perfect tornado 
burst in fury on the heads of numberless victims who had hoped they 
were beyond the reach of the fluctuations of the money market. Cor- 
porations which had weathered all previous storms now lost anchor, and 
were shipwrecked in the general ruin. At length the bankrupt bill was 
introduced into Congress. This, it was thought, would be a panacea 
for all their woes by those who were overwhelmed in debt ; but it was 
a law which told cruelly upon the interests of the hapless creditor. 
Great opposition was manifested, not only by these, but by those also 
who feared the demoralizing effects of such a measure. Mr. Bowles, 
who was then president of the Chamber of Commerce in Louisville, 
united with his colleagues in a protest against the bankrupt law, which, 
for cogency of reasoning, and the solid arguments on which it was based, 
was admitted to be one of the most masterly documents which were pre- 
sented at that session of Congress. Mr. B. was one of the few mer- 
chants who escaped bankruptcy in these perilous times, though his losses 



654 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

in SO extensive a business as he was engaged in at that time were neces- 
sarily great. " Misfortunes seldom come alone." At the height of these 
monetary embarrassments, when our merchants felt their blood almost 
to stagnate within them, the great fire occurred, — a distinctive title to 
which it may well lay claim, as the fury of that devouring element has 
never raged to the same extent within our city either before or since. 
Two blocks of the finest and most commodious warehouses on Main- 
street were consumed, and a vast amount of goods destroyed. It 
started from a wholesale house adjoining the one which Mr. B. occupied, 
about the centre of the square to the corner ; then crossed in an oppo- 
site direction, and burned down the principal part of that street, till it • 
reached a house which !Mr. B. had shortly before vacated. The congra- 
tulations of his acquaintances the next day were general. " Mr. Bowles, 
your are always in luck" — " You were certainly born under a lucky 
star" — were expressions which greeted his ears. " They call me lucky," 
said he to his wife ; " but I rather attribute my escape to the means I 
used to ensure the luck. I should have shared the same fate, probably, 
with my neighbors, had I not used proper precautions to avert it. On 
arriving at the scene of conflagration, 1 found the roof of my house in 
flames. Instead of throwing my doors open, and having my goods 
pitched into the street, I hired several men to enter with me, and barred 
the door, stationing some one to se« that no one entered by force. 
Blankets were plenty. We ascended to the roof, extinguished the 
flames, and then, by the aid of water and blankets, we were able to ar- 
rest its further paogress, and thus I saved my house and goods." 

But, though not losing in this way, yet indirectly he suffered loss. 
The Franklin Fire Insurance CkDmpany, of which he was president, 
had had chartered by the legislature with a capital of ^100,000, and 
he and his colleagues were at first apprehensive that their liabilities, which 
were largely involved in the recent calamity, would prove too heavy 
for their redemption. But, by strenuous exertions, they paid up, and 
extricated themselves, with credit unimpaired. 

In 1837, the charter was obtained from the state legislature by the 
city council, for the organization of a medical institute in the city of 
Louisville. Mr. Bowles, with many others, were actively engaged 
in getting up this noble enterprise, but to Doctor Caldwell it is main- 
ly attributable. This gentleman, who is well known not only in this 
country but in Europe, for his superior talents and great literary attain- 
ments, seeing the great advantages which would accrue to the city from 
such an institution, was unremitting in his exertions in enlightening the 
public mind on the subject. At length the charter was obtained, and 
a noble edifice erected, which stands a monument to his genius and per- 
severance. The council appropriated $50,000 for the outlay. Since 
that time several acres have been set aside on the same tract for a law 
university, high-school, &c. Mr. Bowles was chosen one of the board 
of managers on its organization. The able body of men whom they 
have enlisted from different parts of the Union to fill the professorships, 
reflect great creditupon those who selected them. 

Under the auspices of such men as Caldwell, Cobb, Flint, Yandell, 
Miller, Short, Gross, Silliman, &c., it has risen to its present pre-emi- 
nent station among western schools of medicine, and few at the east 



JOSHUA B. BOWLES, OF KENTUCKY. 655 

have more commanding influence. Commencing in 1838 with a class 
of eighty students, last winter it numbered four hundred, and four 
thousand young men have attended the courses of instruction within 
its walls. 

Mr. Bowles having suffered many severe afflictions by deaths in his 
family, determined to leave the city and retire into the country, tliinking 
it would be conducive to the health of his surviving children. With this 
view, he purchased a beautiful country residence between two and three 
miles from the city, and removed there in the fall of 1842; and here 
we bid adieu to his commercial life. We have endeavored to give a 
short sketch of the life of one of our merchants. We would not be 
thought exclusive. Many similar records might be given of this class 
of our enterprising citizens, men who, more than any other portions of 
a commercial community, give a tone and character to the city in which 
they dwell. 

Louisville may well feel proud of her merchants. For strict integrity 
in their moneyed transactions, for the liberal spirit which they manifest 
on all occasions where their aid is sought, they are justly esteemed no 
less than for their industry and enterprise. 

Mr. Bowles, having removed to the country, pursued the same system- 
atic course which he had adopted in early life. The truism, " The boy 
is father to the man,'' is exemplified in his case. At dawn of day he 
may still be seen taking an early view of all around, and seeing that 
all things are adjusted for the labors of the coming day ; or, not un- 
frequently, with implement in hand, giving a practical illustration of his 
theories. After an early breakfast he drives to town, attends to busi- 
ness, but so soon as bank hours close, returns home, where the remain- 
der of the day is passed in performing the various duties and pleasures 
which belong to the life of a farmer. A sincere lover of nature in all 
her beautiful phases, he never tires of her company, and thus, though 
still engaged somewhat in moneyed concerns, yet most of his time is 
passed in agricultural pursuits, in which his chief pleasures lie. 

In view of writing the life of a merchant, the materials for erecting 
a monument to his memory, which could be of interest to the public 
eye, appear so scant that a feeling of discouragement comes over the 
mind of the writer. His character, as it passes in review before him, 
exhibits none of those traits which serve to intoxicate the mind of the 
reader, or render so easy the task of the narrator. He must deal with 
facts. The plain and unvarnished truths of every-day life are the basis 
on which his arguments are laid. Our duty is fulfilled. 

If one young man should chance, on reading our unpretending pages, 
to resolve to follow in the footsteps of our merchant, we shall feel 
amply repaid for our trouble in elucidating his career. Let him resolve 
to do something as a worthy citizen, or as a son of our glorious repub- 
lic ; and having,' after mature consideration and advice, resolved, let him 
pursue his course unflinching, and with the blessing of Divine Provi- 
ence, his labor shall be crowned with success. 













.iK<>-e— CO.. 



/? 




BUGH A. GARLAND, OF MISSOURI. ' 657 

HUGH A. GARLAND, ESQ., 

OF MISSOURI. 

The subject of this memoir was born in what is now Nelson county^ 
Virginia, on the first day of June, 1805. His father was. Mr. Spots- 
wood Garland, the son of General John Garland, who was accidentally 
killed at Charlottesville, while he was in command of the troops that 
kept guard over Burguoyne's captured army. His mother was Lucinda 
Rose, daughter of Colonel Hugh Rose, of Geddis, Amherst county. 

At the time of Mr. Garland's birth. Nelson was a part of Amherst 
county. It was formed into a county in 1809, and Mr. Spotswood 
Garland was elected the clerk of the county. This office he held until 
the day of his' death, the 30th August, 1850. 

At the age of 16 he entered the freshman class in Hampden Sydney 
College, at that time the most flourishing literary institution in Virginia. 
Its president and professors were men of profound learning, and had 
the talent of txciting an enthusiastic zeal in' their pupils in the pursuit 
of knowledge. 

Hugh A. Garland was a diligent student during the four years he 
remained at college, and graduated with distinguished honors. The 
first year after graduating Mr. Garland spent in the office of his father 
as deputy-clerk. His leisure. hours were devoted to the Greek classics 
and mental philosophy. In September, 1«'2(), when ju-t -Jl years of 
age, he was elected by the trustees of Hampden 8\u.iey College, 
professor of Greek language and literature. In October he married 
Miss Anne P. Burwell, daughter of the late Colonel Armistead Bur- 
well, of Mecklenburg. For four years Mr. Garland devoted himself 
with unremitting ardor to the laborious duiies of his oflice. He also 
found leisure to prosecute the study of the French, Spanish, and Italian 
languages, under the instruction of Colonel Gaspari. the professor of 
modern languages. During this period Mr. Garland frecpiently wrote 
essays for the political newspapers, and delivei'ed addresses on public 
occasions ; one in particular the writer remembers, on the '■ Importance 
of classical studies, as a branch of a liberal education." 

In 1830, Mr. Garland resigned his professorship, and repaired to the 
University of Virginia to prosecute his studies more thoroughly. In 
this institution he devoted one year to the study of physiology and 
anatomy, under the instruction of Dr. Dunglison; he al.so attended 
the lectures of Doctors Paterson and Eniniet, on natural philosophy 
and chemistry. He took German lessons from Dr. iilatterrnitii. and 
attended his courses on Italian, French, and Spanish literature. The 
whole day was given to these scientific and literal y pursuits; the night 
was devoted to the study of law. Mr. Garland did not devote him- 
self to the details of practice, his great object was to ac(juire a thorough 
knowledge of the sources and principles of the Etiglish ciminoii law. 

In December, 1831, Mr. Garland settled in Boydiou, the county 
seat of Mecklenburg, and opened an office for the practice of law. He 
was an entire stranger in the county, and for more than a year being 

42 



658 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

without practice, Mr. Garland devoted himself to the study of his pro- 
fession. Tucker's Commentaries and books of practice were his daily- 
companions. The idleness and dissipation of a village life had no 
temptations for him. Abstemious in his habits, his whole time was 
devoted to the acquisition of knowledge. When not employed in pro- 
fessional studies he read history, or perused the poetic works of Shaks- 
peare, Wordsworth, and Burns, and always returned with renewed 
pleasure to his old favorite author, Coleridge. 

To eke out their limited resources, Mrs. Garland undertook to teach 
a female school, with Mr. Garland's general superintendence and occa- 
sional aid. The school soon became popular and profitable. Many a 
virtuous and accomplished lady in that part of the country will readily 
acknowledge their lasting obligations to the moral and mental train- 
ing to which they were subjected in Mrs. Garland's excellent school. 
Brought up in luxury and affluence, both husband and wife, they were 
not ashamed, when the hour of adversity came, to toil for their daily 
bread, in an occupation which is really the noblest of human pursuits, 
although it has been degraded, by a false public sentiment, below the 
level of other professions. 

On the 3d Monday of November, 1832, Mr. Garland addressed the 
people of Mecklenburg for the first time on political subjects. The 
same day witnessed the assembling of the celebrated nullification con- 
vention in South Carolina. The minds of the people were greatly ex- 
cited on the subject, and it constituted the theme of Mr. Garland's dis- 
course. His speech made a great impression on the public mind, and 
he was immediately announced by his friends as a candidate for a seat 
in the state legislature. Although he was a stranger in the county, at 
the ensuing spring elections he obtained a small majority over several 
very formidable competitors. Until the meeting of the legislature in 
1833, Mr. Garland devoted himself to the duties of his profession, 
which had now become to him a source of interest and of profit. 

The winter of 1833-4 was a time of great excitement on political 
subjects throughout the Union. The war between the government and 
the bank was at its height. General Jackson had removed the public 
deposits from the bank, and had thereby created a great panic in the 
commercial world. The leading object of the whig party, then just or- 
ganizing itself, was to procure a restoration of the deposits, and a pro- 
longation of the life of the bank, whose charter had just been vetoed by 
the President. The excitement in Congress and the Virginia legislature 
was very intense. Clay, Webster and Calhoun were never more powerful 
in their opposition to the measures of the administration than they were 
at that time. General Jackson seemed to be left almost friendless and 
alone. 

The legislature of Virginia, at the time of the election in April, 1833, 
was in favor of the administration, almost without any show of opposi- 
tion. But when it assembled in December, or at least a few weeks 
afterwards, under the influence of the panic speeches delivered in Wash- 
ington, and from other causes, scarcely any of its members had sufficient 
moral courage to stand up and declare themselves to be friends of the 
administration. !Mr. Garland was one of the few who were bold 
enough to do so. About the latter part of January, he made his maiden 



HUGH A. GARLAND, OF MISSOURI. 659 

speech in the legislature, denouncing the coalition which had been 
formed at Washington to destroy General Jackson, and to defeat his 
efforts to put an end to that corrupting institution, the Bank of the 
United States. He had been a silent member of the house up to that 
period. His vehement and earnest manner, his clear and logical style 
of reasoning, took every body by surprise, and at once established his 
character as an able and eloquent debater. The writer of this memoir 
happened to be in the lobby of the house, and well remembers the effect 
produced by this first effort of Mr. Garland on the floor of the legis- 
lature, and the assurance which it gave to his friends of his future emi- 
nence as a politician and a statesman. 

Having taken a decided position in the political world, Mr. Garland 
maintained and defended it with untiring energy and zeal. He called 
to his aid all the rich stores of knowledge which he had been diligently 
laying up for so many years. He wrote an elaborate address to the 
people of Virginia, giving an historical account of the political parties 
and of the great controversies which were then agitating the country. 
The doctrines set forth in that address only met the approbation of the 
members then composing the minority of the legislature. To them it 
was acceptable in the highest degree, but none of them had the bold- 
ness to sign it but Mr. Garland and Col. Joseph S. Watkins, of Gooch- 
land. This address was extensively circulated in the state, and called 
forth elaborate answers from several gentlemen of distinction in the 
whig party. It is said to have exerted great influence in giving direc- 
tion to public sentiment, which, up to that time, had been much dis- 
tracted and divided by the startling and agitating events which had 
so recently taken place in such rapid and quick succession. 

At the close of the session, Mr. Garland met with strong opposition 
at home, but was re-elected by a very handsome majority. When the 
legislature assembled again in December, 1834, the friends of the ad- 
ministration were still in a minority, but their numbers hiid greatly in- 
creased. During this session, Mr. Garland delivered an elaborate 
speech, in which he expressed his views fully on the constitution, on the 
relation of the states to the federal government, and on the importance 
of judging our political institutions by rules purely American, and not 
by principles of interpretation derived from governments wholly dissi- 
milar to our own. No copy of this speech is in our possession, or we 
would gladly make some extracts from it, to illustrate Mr. Garland's 
political views and to give an idea of his mode of reasoning and his 
style of composition. 

At the close of the session, he put forth another minority address to 
the people of Virginia. It was signed by all the members of the mi- 
nority, a fact which clearly proved what a great change had taken place 
in public sentiment in the course of a single year. 

In the spring of 1835 a strenuous and determined effort was made to 
defeat Mr. Garland's election. The strongest men were brought out 
as candidates by the opposite party, and all the wealth and influence 
of the county were arrayed against him. But he resorted to no unwor- 
thy or extraordinary means to secure his election. He made it a rule 
to speak to the people at large on public affairs — appealed to their in- 
telligence and sense of justice. Having given an account of his steward- 



660 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

ship he left the result in the hands of his constituents. He was again 
re-elected by an increased majority. From this time forth he was 
elected without opposition, so long as he remained a citizen of the 
county of Mecklenburg. 

The next legislature, 1835 and '3G, found the administration in the 
majority, but another subject of agitation threw its true friends into a 
minority. This was a season of great excitement on the abolition 
question. In the summer before, meetings had been held in all parts 
of the state, denouncing "abolition societies" and requiring strict legis- 
lation to put them down. The whig party, especially the Calhoun por- 
tion, which did not separate from the whigs till 1837, advocated ultra 
measures and were warm for a southern convention and a southern or- 
ganization. Mr. Garland opposed their views with great ability.' The 
debate was protracted and animated. Mr. Garland took the lead in the 
discussion and spoke frequently in reply to those who opposed the con- 
ciliatory course he advocated. His speeches on that occasion are to be 
found in the Richmond Enquirer of that day. He said "that the battle 
had to be fought in the northern states, and that the democracy of those 
states would maintain the cause of the south if the south should be true to 
them. He had faith in the northern democracy and would take no steps 
to alienate them from the south." He was chairman of the committee to 
whom was referred the petitions and resolutions of the people on the 
abolition question. The majority reported resolutions opposed to his 
views. lie wrote a minority report in which this whole subject of 
slavery and abolitionism is reviewed. 

In December, 183G. some months before the deposit banks suspended 
specie payments, Mr. (7;irland offered in the Virginia legislature a series 
of resolutions advocating an independent treasury system. These reso 
lutions were followed l)y a series of essays in the Richmond Enquirer 
urging the necessity of separating the government altogether from banks 
and of restoring the public treasury to its constitutional character. 

In the session of 1837 and '38, Mr. Garland wrote the report on the 
right of instruction, and was mainly instrumental in carrying it through 
the legislature. It met with much opposition, and strenuous efforts 
were made to amend and modify it ; but it was adopted in the form and 
language in which it was originally reported. 

Mr. Garland was for five years a member of the Virginia legislature 
and took an active and leading part in all its proceedings, made many 
.speeches, drew up many able reports, and wrote many essays, which 
were published and highly complimented in the newspapers of the day. 
With the view of withdrawing from politics and devoting his whole 
time to the practice of the law, he removed from the county of Meck- 
lenburg and settled on a farm in the neighborhood of Petersburg. 
He opened an office in that town in the spring of 1838. In December 
following he was unexpectedly invited by some of the leading mem- 
bers of Congress to become a candidate for the clerkship of the Plouse of 
Representatives. He consented and was elected. 

At the meeting of the twenty-sixth Congress, which took place in 
December. 1839, as the clerk of the preceding House of Representatives, 
he was called to act on the famous New-Jersey question. After the 
house was finally organized, Mr. Garland was re-elected as its clerk. 



HUGH A. GARLAND, OF MISSOURI. 661 

On the passage of the independent treasury bill, the 4th of July, 1840, 
Mr. Garland was invited to address a mass meeting in Castle Garden, 
in the city of New-York, in commemoration of that great event. His 
speech is now before me. The commencement of it is very poetic, and 
the style throu.hout is very lofty and ambitious. In this speech Mr. 
Garland attempts to give a short and condensed view of the progress 
of human opinions on the subject of government and of the gradual de- 
velopment of the principles of civil and religious liberty, ending in the 
all-absorbing topic with him — the downfall of the United States Bank, 
and the restoration of the government to its original and primitive foun- 
dation. This speech exhibits Mr. Garland's usual ability, and the 
straightforward and guileless simplicity of his unsophisticated nature. 
He cannot help being in earnest when engaged in the pursuit of what 
he considers essential to the welfare and happiness of the human family, 
or when contending for the honor and glory of his country. 

The twenty-seventh Congress, which was called together in an extra 
session by General Harrison, May, 1841, having a whig majority, 
elected Matthew St. Clair Clarke, clerk of the house. Mr. Garland 
retired to his farm near Petersburg, and devoted himself for some 
years exclusively to literary pursuits. Having a moderate com- 
petence, and no aspirations after wealth, he gave himself up wnth re- 
newed zeal to his favorite studies. Coleridge, Carlyle, and Kant, the 
" Critic of Pure Reason," were his daily companions. The composi- 
tions that came from his pen nt this time have never been given to the 
public. Some two or three speeches, delivered on various occasions, 
were published, and among others was a eulogy on the life and ser- 
vices of General Jackson, delivered in Petersburg in July, 1845. It 
exhibits the characteristic traits of Mr. Garland's mind, his enthusiastic 
admiration of General Jackson's character, and his devoted attachment 
to what he considers the peculiar and fundamental principles of the 
constitution of the United States. 

About this time an important change took place in Mr. Garland's 
pecuniary affairs, which has given quite a new direction to his efforts 
and his labors. He had embarked a small sum of money in a mercan- 
tile partn.ership, in Petersburg, Virginia, and entrusted the entire 
management of it to the young gentleman who was his partner in 
business, and in whom he had the most implicit confidence. He sel- 
dom visited the store, but devoted himself at home to pursuits of 
science and literature. In a short time the partnership was involved 
in bankruptcy and ruin. This was a severe and unexpected misfor- 
tune to Mr. Garland and his young family. No event is better calcu- 
lated to test the strength of a man's character than one like this. Mr. 
Garland did not hesitate on this trying occasion. He surrendered all 
his private fortune for the benefit of the creditors of the partnership. 
He reserved nothing for himself or his helpless family. At the age of 
forty he began life again without a farthing. He removed to St. Louis, 
and again commenced the practice of the law. His spirits have not 
flagged. He devotes himself to labor and intense study with the same 
ardor that characterized him when the writer first knew him, as a 
fellow-student, at Hampden Sydney College. 

The field of law, as it exhibits itself in Missouri, is peculiarly fitted 



662 , SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

to his mind. "Where there are so many conflicting elements, common 
law, civil, French, and Spanish law, statute law — congressional, terri- 
torial, and state — it requires a mind trained as his has been to grapple 
with so many different and conflicting codes of law, and to reduce them 
to a consistent, sound, and just system. Mr. Garland at present de- 
votes himself exclusively to his professional pursuits, and takes a true 
pleasure in profound legal investigations. He hardly allows himself 
time for keeping up with the politics, science, and literature, of the 
day, so intense is his zeal in his favorite pursuit. His summer vaca- 
tions, immediately after his removal to St. Louis, were devoted to the 
composition of the life of John Randolph, which work was published 
in 1850. 

Mr. Garland still takes an interest in those great political principles 
of the democratic party to which he devoted so much of his life, but 
he has taken no active part in politics since he became a citizen of 
Missouri, and has kept aloof from the party strifes that have distracted 
the democracy in this state for the last four or five years. 

In the important causes entrusted to Mr. Garland, he has made it a 
rule, to write out in full, and to print the argument by which he sus- 
tains his cause. We have some of them before us at this time ; they 
evince his capacity for research, his thorough knowledge of the great 
principles of jurisprudence, his devotion to the interests of his clients, 
and his invincible determination to go to the bottom of the cause he is 
investigating. Mr. Garland's ability as a lawyer has not yet become 
fully known in the state to which he removed only a few years since. 
His habits are reserved and retiring. He loves the retired seclusion 
of his office, and the profound study of his favorite authors, too much 
to be as much conversant with the busy world around him as would be 
conducive to his fame, and have a greater tendency to promote his 
pecuniary interests. His talents are not superficial and brilliant, 
shining forth at once with the most intense splendor, and gradaally 
diminishing their brightness until they seem to fade away from the eye 
of the beholder. On the contrary, they are solid and substantial, only 
developing themselves as occasion calls for their exercise, and they are 
most highly estimated by those who are most intimately acquainted 
with him. He is esteemed by his associates at the bar as a profound 
and learned jurist, and his opinion as to intricate, difficult, and abstruse 
points of law is held by them in the highest reverence. His great 
learning, his unwearied diligence, and his unblemished integrity, will 
no doubt yet secure for him a brilliant professional career. 

It is certainly to be regretted, on some accounts, that he so early em- 
barked on the stormy sea of politics, and that so much of his life has 
been spent amid the strifes and contentions that vex and disturb 
the political firmament. Successful as he has been in accomplishing so 
much in the hazardous and dangerous pursuit in which he was so long 
engaged, it is evident that he was more eminently qualified to distin- 
guish himself in another and a very different sphere. Had he never 
been tempted to forsake the calm and peaceful performance of his pro- 
fessional duties — had he given his whole soul and all his energies, with 
out interruption, to the study of the great principles of jurisprudence, 
his fame, as a lawyer would have been much greater ; and yet it admits 



HUGH A. GARLAND, OF MISSOURI. 663 

of a doubt, if his experience in political life, has not in some respects 
more fully prepared him for the perfect investigation, and just appre- 
hension of many of the difficult questions, which must necessarily come 
before the man, who is engaged in the practice of law in the United 
States of America. 

Mr. Garland, by the publication of the life of John Randolph, has, 
beyond all question, acquired for himself no little reputation in the lite- 
rary world. It was a work prepared for the press under great disad- 
vantages. It was commenced about the time that Mr. Garland ex- 
perienced the great reverse in his pecuniary circumstances, which was 
so peculiarly painful to himself, and which would have completely 
overwhelmed a man of less firmness and decision of character. It was 
partly written during the prevalence of the cholera, as an epidemic, in 
the city of St. Louis. Hundreds were dying around him daily. The 
more wealthy citizens were flying with consternation from the scene of 
contagion and of death. But Mr. Garland had a large and helpless 
family to support. He had a broken down fortune to repair, and 
neither the heat of summer, nor the presence of a malignant epidemic, 
which filled the minds of other men with terror, could induce him to 
suspend his labors, or to seek safety in flight ; calmly putting his trust 
in an overruling Providence, he toiled on at his task, and accomplished 
the object he had in view. 

The favor with which Mr. Garland's life of John Randolph was re- 
ceived by the public, bears a sufficient and satisfactory evidence as to 
the literary abilities of its author. The work met with a ready sale. It 
has already passed through several editions, and has been a source of 
very considerable profit to Mr. Garland. If any fault is to be found 
with it, it is that the author attempted to extend his work rather beyond 
the legitimate limits of a biography. Mr. Garland evidently designed 
to make it a political history of the times, in which Mr. Randolph 
lived, tracing very clearly to their source the different changes which 
have taken place among politicians in our country, with reference to the 
powers of the general government. In this efibrt Mr. Garland very 
happily succeeded. 

His work furnishes a vast amount of information with respect to the 
state of public opinion, and the attitude of our dilTerent political parties 
during the long and interesting period that Mr. Randolph held a seat in 
the Congress of the United States. Mr. Garland's delineation of John 
Randolph's character was faithful and striking. He gave a just promi- 
nence to his many virtues, and rare and excellent qualities, both of head 
and heart ; but did not forget, or attempt to conceal his peculiarly 
morbid nervous excitability, which rendered him so wonderfully eccen- 
tric in his manners, and so completely unlike all other men. Ample 
justice was done by Mr. Garland to Mr. Randolph's surprising talents 
and matchless eloquence in debate ; but it was impossible for him, or 
any other man, to give the world a correct idea of the quickness of Mr. 
Randolph's powers at repartee, of the brilliancy of his genius, of his 
withering sarcasm, or of the delicate strain of wit and humor which ran 
through his speeches in the Senate, and all his familiar conversations at 
the fire-side with his intimate friends. There was a combination of op- 
posite and conflicting qualities in Mr. Randolph's character, which it 



664 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

was hard to delineate ; but Mr. Garland succeeded in painting and em- 
bellishing a faithful portrait of Mr. Randolph's private character — 
of his peculiarities and his rare endowments, which has certainly been 
' no small contribution to the literature of our country. 

Mr. Garland's success as an author, has been a temptation to. him to 
engage in the composition of some more elaborate and important his- 
torical work ; but he has been prevented from doing so by the urgent 
nature of his professional duties. He wields a ready pen, and literary 
labors are to him a source of pleasure, rather than of irksome and 
fatiguing toil. 

In this brief memoir the peculiar traits of Mr. Garland's mind have 
perhaps been sufficiently developed, although it has-been done incident- 
ally in giving a hasty narrative of his life. Patient thought and a habit 
of profound investigation, constitute his grand mental peculiarity. . His 
diligence and untiring application to study has made him the master of 
a rich store of varied knowledge. His reading has taken a. wide range. 
He has explored the domains of ancient and modern literature. He 
hasmade himself familiarwithmostofthe ancient and modern languages. 
The beauties of poetry and the subtilties of metaphysics have not been 
without their charms for him; and' his ability as a writer, and his 
readiness as a debater, and eloquence as a speaker, have enabled him 
at all times to employ efficiently and successfully whatever: knowledge 
he had obtained from books, or by his study of the different characters 
of men in his intercourse with .the world. 

Mr. G. is as yet only in the prime of life. Possessed naturally of a 
good constitution, his abstemious habits and his constant activity have 
preserved his strengthunimpaired. Years have only improved his judg- 
ment, without diminishing his capacity for labor ; and should no untimely 
blight overtake him, or unlooked-for calamity overshadow his prospects, 
we may anticipate for him a long career of usefulness and of honor. 

But justice would not be done to the subject of this memoir. if some- 
thing more was not said with reference. to his private character. • Pie 
has been long known to the writer of this imperfect sketch, and he can 
truly say, that he never knew any man more perfectly amiable in all 
the domestic relations of life. As a friend, as a father, as a husband, 
and as a Christian, his conduct has ever been, most exemplary and 
blameless. His uprightness and integrity have; never been called 
in question. They have passed unharmed through a series of the most 
severe trials, and still more dangerous temptations. As a public offi- 
cer, and as a private citizen, his character has been alike free from. re- 
proach. No temptation could allure him from the. path of rectitude. 
No danger, however formidable, could deter him from, the performance 
of his duty. A child-like simplicity characterizes his intercourse with 
society. There is no appearance of malice or of guile about him. 'He 
is mild and unassuming in his manners, and yet stern and unflinching 
in his adherence to truth and justice. He reminds us of a portrait 
drawn by the hand of a master in the delineation of human character: 

Justum ac tenacem propositi virum 
Non civium ardor prava jubentium, 
Non vultus instantis tyranni 
.Mente quatit solida, neque Auster. 



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WIIilAM H. MILLS, OF MAINE. 665 



HON. WILLIAM II. MILLS, 

OF BANGOR, MAINE. 

Hon. William H. Mills, a gentleman of middle age, was bora in 
the State of Vermont, and migrated to Portland, Me., when quite 
young, where he was for several years engaged in mercantile pursuits. 

In 1835 he removed to the city of Bangor for the purpose of entering 
upon the duties of cashier of the Eastern Bank, then just chartered, 
which situation he still holds. 

Colonel Mills belongs with that class of reliable men in whom all 
have confidence, and who, from a natural kindness of heart and urbanity 
of manners, never have enemies. 

He has been repeatedly elected to either branch of the city council, 
and twice unanimously elected to the office of mayor of the city, which 
office he declined to hold longer, the public drafts being too heavy upon 
the duties of his profession. 

Colonel Mills has long been a great admirer of the illustrious soldier 
and statesman who is now the candidate of the whig party for the Pre- 
sidency, and labored hard for his nomination in 1848, and subsequently 
did much to bring about the great unanimity of sentiment in his state 
in favor of that great and good man. He represented the Fifth Con- 
gressional District in the whig national convention at Baltimore in June 
last, where he evinced an untiring zeal to effect the nomination of his fa- 
vorite candidate, and no one rejoiced more than he at the glorious con- 
summation of his wishes. The "Maine Delegation" will not soon be 
forgotten by the members of that convention or the country at large. 




jHE© N. "F KAN CIS M WLII^ILE !•: Tdi G G. 



o/^ Jv:4 sjivjLJ./-: 7'£A'nijs^'i:e . 



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FRANCIS BRINLET FOGG, OF TENNESSEE. 667 



FRANCIS BRINLEY FOGG, 

I 

OF NASHVILLE, TENNESSEE, 

Was born in Brooklyn, Connecticut, on the 21st of September, 
1795. His father, the Rev. Daniel Fogg — a native of New-Hamp- 
shire — was a clergyman of the Protestant Episcopal Church, and ful- 
filled the duties of his sacred office for forty-one years, in the same 
parish, honored and esteemed for his goodness and piety, by all men 
of all classes, and every Christian denomination. His mother, whose 
maiden name was Brinley, came from one of the most respected and 
respectable familes in New-England — she ornamented and piously 
adorned a long life by the practice of all the virtues of her sex, and 
died a few years ago, in extreme old age, crowned with unclouded hope 
and faith, and blessed to her last hour in the full enjoyment of all her 
faculties. 

The immediate subject of this brief memoir — the oldest of his father's 
offspring — continued under the parental roof until he had reached his 
tenth year, receiving, up to that age, such instruction only as could be 
obtained at home and in the common schools of the township. He 
was subsequently removed, for further culture and improvement, to a 
classical academy in Plainfield, where he was quickly noted by his 
teacher, and all his youthful associates, for his extraordinary attainments 
in the ancient languages, and in the different branches of mathematics. 
So rare and rapid, indeed, were the varied powers of his mind, that a 
few years of study at Plainfield earned him unrivaled distinction, and 
satisfied his friends that he possessed, in an eminent degree, an intellect 
sufficiently strong to master any language and every science, however 
abstruse or difficult of comprehension. When he left that academy, 
though only thirteen years old, he was, in fact, an accomplished scholar 
in the Greek and Latin readings ; and having, ever since, industriously 
kept up his learning, he happily retains, to this day, a ready and pro- 
found acquaintance with both of these languages. 

There are few of those who shall read this rapid sketch, especially 
men of New-England, who will not have heard of the Hon, William 
Hunter, of Newport, Rhode Island — an able, great and eminent states- 
man and civilian — for some years a senator in Congress from his state, 
and, in the latter part of his life, American minister at the court of Bra^ 
zil. Erudite and learned himself, devoted to the beauties of literature 
and the fine arts, and the generous patron of genius in others, this dis- 
tinguished gentleman, delighted with the early talents, the application 
and the remarkable acquirements of a promising kinsman, invited his 
youthful relative — the subject of these lines — to pursue his studies, in- 
cluding the study of law, in his family at Newport, and under his own 
immediate care and instruction. Nor could a more sincere friend, or 
competent teacher, have offered to discipline and direct the mental 
energies of a virtuous and aspiring lad. The boon, so nobly volunteer- 



668 • SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS, i 

ed, was thankfully accepted, and henceforth, between the tutor and his 
pupil, a congeniality of taste and sentintient, and great natural endow- 
ments, generating a warm mutual attachment, united age and boyhood 
in a bond of friendship which was never severed ; and which, in its 
happy consequences, blessed both the giver and receiver of an inesti- 
mable favor — the former, in. the subsequent contemplation of the rich 
fruits of his own beneficent care and culture; the latter, in the fortune, 
fame and honor he has since so proudly achieved among men. 

Under the guidance of his accomplished master, the youthful student 
of our text, full of hope and courage, applied himself dilligently ; and 
"being gifted by nature with a powerful and retentive memory, and a 
mind capable of deep research and the severest mental service, garnered, 
■in a few years, abundant and lasting stores from every department of 
knowledge. He made especial and successful preparation in that par- 
ticular branch to which he had resolved to devote his life ; and having, 
at the age of twenty, sufficiently qualified himself, he made formal ap- 
plicationfor a legal cdrhmission, and obtained admittance to the New- 
port bar. Nor was he suffered to take this early and difficult honor 
■without a close and critical examination before a learned and inflexible 
tribunal : for, in the strict discipline of that day — more rigid by far than 
this — neither the courts of justice nor the people could be induced to 
countenance superficial learning in the profession, or to patronize a pre- 
sumptuous and half taught candidate, who, unprepared for the high and 
responsible warrant, had the vanity to demand the dignity of the gown 
and a green bag ; and it is to be deplored — deeply deplored, indeed — 
that the same stringent regulations, in regard to authorized member- 
ship in a great and indispensable department of our civil polity, does 
not still prevail in every part of our country ; for it must be readily 
granted by every considerate observer, that if the bar was only accessi- 
ble to men of tried and established worth, with suitable qualifications, 
much public injury and mischief would be averted ; our courts would 
be, as they always should be, the venerated sanctuaries of justice, and 
the profession would be relieved of much of the prejudice and obloquy 
which ignorant, unworthy and discreditable empirics, have too frequently 
cast upon it. 

At the time, too, of which we now speak, the bar in the principal 
cities of New-England — always renowned for learning and integrity — 
was everywhere adorned and occupied by men whose just influence 
and. popularity had monopolized the practice of the different courts, and 
left'little or no immediate room for new beginners in the profession. 
A long, tedious and doubtful struggle awaited every junior aspirant for 
forensic honor and employment ; so long, indeed, that no young man of 
limited means, however great his courage or acquirements, could pru- 
dently hazard, on the most flattering prospective hopes, the probation 
he would necessarily have to encounter; whilst he tarried atthethresh- 
hold, like the afflicted Hebrew, for the troubling of the healing waters 
of the pool, he must eat, and drink, and dress ; and the charge for 
these, thoughnever so cheap, would drain his scanty purse, and leave 
him to' want and destitution, or to the cold, humbling and reluctant 
charity of friends and relatives. It was so at that day in New-England 
in every department of life ; it is more so now under the necessities of 



FRANCIS BRINLKY FOGG, OF TENNESSEE. C69 

a largely increased and increasing population. But then, as now, the 
spirit of the "pilgrim fathers" stimulated their sons and descendants, 
and taught them that it was more noble and manly to strive for peace 
and happiness and fortune in a land of strangers, than to linger, sicken- 
ed and discouraged under "hope deferred," around the graves of the 
unpromising homes of their ancestors. It was this spirit which made 
and still makes New-England the hive whence issue, to the "Great 
West," and everywhere over the civilized. world, yearly and large sup- 
plies of talent, of indomitable industry and enterprise, and, in a just 
homage to truth, we must add, of men, most of whom carry with them, 
whithersoever they go, a characteristic trait of soberness, shrewdness, 
and accumulative industry, , And it was this same spirit which, politely 
rejecting a generous offer from . his . great friend and instructor, Mr. 
Hunter, to join him in the profession at the Philadelphia bar on equal 
shares in their practice, induced the subject of this short story, in the 
early dawn of manhood, to become a cheerful exile, and to follow his 
fortunes, whatever they might be, in a remote society, and among peo- 
ple of whom he had heard but little, and knew still less. Accordingly, 
at a tender age in life, having only passed his twenty-second year, and 
with money barely sufficient to defray the necessary expense of travel- 
ing, he bade a painfal adieu to his family, his friends, and all the loved 
scenes of his native land ; and, passing through Washington, where he 
remained a few days, he continued his journey, until, in the month of 
February, 1818, he reached and settled himself in Columbia, a beauti- 
ful and thriving village ia Tennessee, about forty miles south from the 
city of Nashville. 

Many there must be among his resolute countrymen, who, having 
enterprised a similar fate, could pencil, better than we can, the strong 
emotions of a young and lonely adventurer, when he finds himself 
seated, for the first time, in a new home, surrounded by an " unknow- 
ing and unknown" multitude, and withal, an object of attraction to 
every gazing and inquisitive eye. 'Tis then that the iron-hearted 
stranger — silently contemplating the past, the present and the future — 
remembering all he has left and lost, and all he then beholds, and 
dreading the days to come with all their doubtful fortunes — sinks be- 
neath his own profound reflection, and repents, perhaps, the folly or 
the courage that taught him, in an evil hour, to exchange every endear- 
ment, and all the ties and tender associations of life, for any hope or 
hopeful expectation of honor or of profit. Some, it is true, better able 
to conceal than to resist the feeling, may be too proud to show or ac- 
knowledge the amiable weakness. But the instincts of nature — the 
same in every human bosom — cannot be so easily repressed ; and all 
mankind, of every clime, of every tongue, and of every condition, 
feeling the force of these instincts, prove this '• common law" of huma- 
nity by submitting to its supremacy. Time, we admit, with now in- 
terests and new associations, may heal or harden the wounds of the 
exile's heart. Time will almost always mellow, sanctify, and finally 
cure the deepest and keenest cuts of the soul; but, although it may 
obscure their brightness, time can never obliterate the fond and ineffac- 
able images which memory has imprinted on the mind. In the spring- 
day of youth, in vigorous manhood, and alike in the dimness of old 



G70 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

age — wherever we go, or how far soever we may remove — we cling for 
ever to cherished recollections, and pay eternal love and homage to the 
scenes, and the joys and affections of our early, thoughtless, or happy 
hours. How it fared on this occasion with the subject of this brief his- 
tory, we know not. We are certain, nevertheless, that we should do 
gross injustice to his benevolent nature, and to the deep attachments he 
always manifests, if we should suppose him incapable of painful reflec- 
tions, where, under similar circumstances, much sterner hearts have 
bowed submissively and in sorrow to the uninvited, but grateful visions 
of the past. But, whatever he may have suffered, we are sure he did 
not forget his dignity, or give way to useless repinings. Opening an 
office at once, he returned to his studies with renewed eagerness and 
ambition; and cultivating in the meantime a proper acquaintance with 
the society into which he had so lately entered, it was not long before 
he engaged the notice, and gained the respect and consideration of all 
observing people. Patronage, with its emoluments, would have soon 
followed, but a more broad and elevated platform awaited the labor and 
the exhibitions of our young adventurer. 

The late Hon. Felix Grundy, justl}- celebrated in his day as a dis- 
tinguished statesman, and an able and very eloquent advocate, possess- 
ed in a high degree the ready faculty of discerning genius and merit under 
the most plain and unpretending attire. He was, at the same time, 
equally ready to encourage the growth and developments of such 
happy endowments wherever he found them ; but especially, whenever 
he saw youth and talent struggling, unaided and unadvised, in a doubt- 
ful conflict against the united antngonism of poverty and the cold and 
repulsive friendship of an unfeeling world. Remarkable, too, for an 
easy, kind and afflible address, and for the most agreeable powers of 
conversation, that gentleman had, with many other attractive qualities, 
an eminent facility in winning the confidence and good opinion of all 
who enjoyed his society. 

Fortunately for the subject of this memoir, Mr. Grundy was, at this 
particular period in our narrative, a regular attendant on the Columbia 
bar. There, in that free and cordial intercourse which then signalized 
the members of the profession, an introduction between the parties, 
leading, as it did, to frequent intercourse, speedily satisfied that gentle- 
man of the great personal worth and extraordinary attainments of the 
youthful stranger ; and he lost no time in frankly advising him of his 
faulty location, and earnestly commending his immediate removal to 
Nashville. The limited means, and that natural diffidence which first 
induced Mr. Grundy's new acquaintance to seat himself in Columbia, 
were forgotten, or soon overcome by the plausible arguments of his ex- 
perienced counselor, and thenceforth Nashville, with all its undeniable 
advantages, social and professional, became his home, and has ever 
since been the principal theatre of his actions. This important move 
was executed in the latter part of 1818, and, in its consequences, sealed 
for good the fortune of the worthy subject of this hasty treatise. 

At the time of which we now write — as many of the living here will 
testify — Tennessee, though celebrated for her patriotism and for the 
heroic achievements -which closed our last war with England in a 
blaze of glory, was little more than a strong frontier province, chiefly 



FRANCIS BRINLEY FOGG, OF TENNESSEE. GTl 

populated — comparatively speaking — by a rough, but honest, brave 
and unsophisticated people ; and Nashville, the acknowledged city of 
the state — was no more than a large and very respectable village. 
Nevertheless the Nashville bar, which in anterior years had acquired 
and always held a goodly fame, was then renowned throughout the 
state and in many foreign parts, for the learning, the great abilities, 
and the honorable bearing of its members. There were among them 
men whose giant powers and cultivated minds could have successfully 
grappled with the learning and the lore of the oldest and most refined 
communities, and men, too, whose great names remain, to this day, 
richly perfumed in the history of the profession. Their manner of 
practice was liberal, though, in the progress of the day in which they 
lived, they had not sufficiently learned to question or condemn the ab- 
surd technicalities of the law, those astute and fast departing mumme- 
ries of a distant and darker age of legal science. Their rivalries were, 
for the most part, peaceful and honorable; and it was their habit to 
extend to their worthy juniors great condescensions and the kindest en- 
couragement. 

In their intercourse, which was always easy and informal, manhood 
and youth mingled freely at the social banquet; the former was 
never arrogant, the latter never unmindful of proper observances to 
their superiors. Such was the bar into which our adventurer had just 
entered ; such the character of its principal members. If he could not 
flatter himself with a prospect of immediate employment, he was sure, 
at least, of the society and friendship of men of agreeable and highly 
improved minds. He was, too, under the special regard and protection 
of a liberal, generous and enlightened relative, residing not far from 
Nashville, whose good heart had opened an ample purse and placed its 
whole contents at his command. Pleased with the change of residence, 
and encouraged by the better prospect before him, he seated himself 
again to his studies, well content to wait, in becoming patience, the 
issue of his exertions. 

Another man, with half the intellect and preparation, but possessed of 
a larger share of boldness and self-confidence, would have successfully 
hastened that issue, and much sooner crowned himself with the emolu- 
ments of the profession. We have often, still, in this more enlightened 
age, to witness and lament the truth of this criticism ; and we shall be 
compelled to witness and lament its truth so long as mankind, too often 
taking sound for sense, suffer themselves to pass by true merit only to 
be captivated and carried away by the false but winning displays of 
superficial learning. In these ways of conceit or forward assumptions, 
our new-comer was poorly gifted ; for in his temper and disposition, 
vanity and self-confidence have no place whatever. He was not, we 
dare say, unconscious of his own strength ; but naturally modest, diffi- 
dent and retiring, and altogether devoid of popular art, he could not 
advance himself by practices which, when adroitly played off", seldom 
fail to promote the fortune of inferior minds. Under the operation of 
these virtuous but unpropitious causes, his progress was, of course, re- 
tarded. But the slowness of his professional growth — by giving him 
larger opportunities for study and reflection — added strength and soli- 
dity to his forensic conquests, and in these consequences, assured the 



672 SKBTOHBS OF EMINENT AMBRI0AN8. 

height and durability of the fame he has subsequently accomplished. 
By the members of the bar, with whom he would be in daily contact 
he hoped, no doubt, to be somewhat favored in an introduction to pub- 
lic notice and consideration ; for as they must be the first to weigh and 
estimate his pretensions, it was not vain on his part to : suppose that 
they would, at no very distant day, invite his aid and co-operation in 
the management and dispatch of business. Nor,' in this respect, if such 
were his reflections, was he at all mistaken or disappointed ; for it so 
soon afl-erwards happened that, by the countenance and good opinions 
of the few who knew him, as well as by his studious habits, and by a 
quiet and becoming exhibition of his legal knowledge, he attracted the 
observation and applause of his plder brethren. An adept in that most 
difficult branch of legal science, he was first employed to make up 
pleadings; and, blessed with a strong memory and a ready and won- 
derful acquaintance with the books, he was next brought into counsel, 
and not unfrequently engaged in the preparation of bills and answers in 
chancery. These. tokens of approved personal worth and professional 
skill led to an unsolicited partnership with a most worthy and long 
established attorney of the Nashville bar; and, as a notable fact in the 
history of this connection,' we may remark, that it was the means of 
gaining him an advocacy, with a large contingent fee, in a suit for wild 
and distant lands, the successful recovery of which, in the subsequent 
rapid increased value of many " broad acres," gave him a very large 
reward for his services. 

Thenceforth the way was open to the man of this short record. His 
reputation was fairly established by the united judgment of his profes- 
sional compeers, and the foundation of his fortune thereby securely 
laid. But as patronage, where the leading members of the bar are suf- 
ficiently enlightened and attentive, does not readily run into new chan. 
nels, the number of his retainers, though steadily advancing, did not 
yet correspond with his just claims and his acknowledged abilities. A 
good practice, 'tis true, gave him ample support, with moderate accu- 
mulations ; but he was left still with many leisure hours. They were 
not, however, hours of idleness or of fruitless discontent ; for, imbued 
by nature with a mind which is as happily exempt from despondency 
as from its opposite weakness, he pursued, mider every phase of life, 
"the even tenor of his way." In his office and by his books — the 
temple and the earthly idols of his heart — mingling, in his daily exer- 
cises, the study of law with polite and abstruse literature, and never 
forgetting to keep up and extend his critical learning in the ancient clas- 
sics, he was constantly improving himself, and enlarging the rich and 
abundant stores that have since obtained, for his judgments and opin- 
ions, oracular confidence and authority. 

In our worldly affairs it sometimes pleases Fortune to lend a capri- 
cious smile, where neither true merit, nor wisdom, nor industry, entitles 
an unworthy object to the grateful concession. But, less fickle in her 
gifts and good-will than the sportive goddess is famed to be, that poetic 
deity seldom fails to add her grace and blessing wherever virtue, and 
constancy, and qualification, unite to aid the good man in an heroic strug- 
gle for honest promotion. ' In the former case, her wavering and un- 
stable countenance is, oftentimes, quickly clouded or forever turned 



FRANCIS BRINtEY FOGG, OF TKNKKSSEK, 673 

from an undeserving favorite; in the latter, patience and perseverance, 
with the help of time and opportunity, will, under many disadvantages, 
sustain our efforts, and, in the end, crown our labors and our trembling 
hopes with a propitious and lasting harvest of honor and profit. Nor 
do we know of any one whose progress and career illustrate more 
handsomely than his the truth of this last reflection. Penniless, 
friendless, young, and a stranger — a voluntary exile for the sake of the 
hope before him, and armed alone with his learning and integrity — he 
abandoned his native soil and all its manifold endearments, and resolutely 
built his youthful home in a distant land, and in the midst of an un- 
known people. We have followed him through the gloom which, in 
the early moments of his enterprise, shadowed his path ; we have 
witnessed the courage and firmness with which he braved all difficulties 
and every disappointment ; and we behold him now, at the end of his 
probation, without pride and without vanity, seated at the side of the 
very foremost of his profession, honored of all men, and daily attended 
by a crowd of rewarding clients. Great, indeed, is his triumph — not 
greater, we faithfully proclaim, than the measure of his high and indis- 
putable claims do justly challenge. 

It was thus, soon after he had passed his twenty-eighth year, that this 
virtuous and gifted man so happily succeeded in executing the great ob- 
ject and design of his life. Poor, but full of laudable ambition, and trust- 
ing to his own good valor and resolution, he came to us in quest of a 
home, of honorable employment, and of a name worthy to be noted 
among men. By his talents and application, and by his amiable, dig- 
nified, and unpretending deportment, he commanded the applause and 
enlisted the good feelings of his elder brethren at the bar, and finally 
attained before the public an enviable and extending fame, together 
with all the emoluments that follow high professional distinction. The 
means too — upright and honorable — that enabled him to reach this 
eminence, proved the strength and the broad basis of his reputation, and 
gave the most reliable promise of a happy and prosperous future. He 
could well, then, and with a prudent confidence, contemplate a new and 
important relation in life ; and he thence resolved to seek, at the 
domestic altar, those solid and precious enjoyments that can only be 
hoped for or found in a congenial, affectionate, and enduring union of 
the sexes. Accordingly, in the fall of 1823, having previously engaged 
his heart to a lady, young, lovely, and admired for her personal charms 
and for the brightness of her intellect and her acquirements, he was 
married to a daughter descended, on both sides, from ancestors pre- 
eminently revered and distinguished in the Revolutionary annals of 
South Carolina for chivalry and patriotism, and for a pure and self- 
sacrificing devotion to American liberty. To our well-informed readers 
we need not elucidate this text by repeating the historic names of Mid- 
dleton and Rutledge — patriots and statesmen of an age that " tried 
men's souls," and which, for good or for evil, consecrated or doomed 
their characters with posterity. 

This alliance — cherished and heartily sanctioned by the parents of 
the bride — enlarged the happiness of their adopted son, and widened 
the circle of his associations ; but it did not interrupt his professional 
labors, or abate the ardor with which he had previously pursued his 

43 



i674 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

Studies and engagements. In his habits of industry he found time to 
cultivate the gladness of his new estate, and, withal, to forward the 
business of his clients, and still to augment, by close and continued 
literary research, his large stock of learning. Such, indeed, was his un- 
relaxed observance of all these voluntary duties, that the honey-moon, 
■which, to most others, is a lengthened carnival of exhausting or un- 
profitable pleasure, was to him — in the brightness and freshness of his 
joy — only a season of quiet felicity, softened and refined in the absence 
of all nuptial parade, by the purity and significance of strong, but silent 
emotion.^. 

This last important step, on his part, was soon followed by a new 
professional association, which, after a peaceful and happy existence for 
nearly the fourth of a century, was amicably terminated within the last 
few years, leaving the parties, where that association found them, mu- 
tually allied, and bound together in reciprocal sentiments of profound 
.and unalterable confidence and attachment. 

A member of the Nashville bar — raised and educated in that city, 
and fortunately favored with a large practice and a corresponding in- 
come — finding himself unable to keep up the business of his office, in- 
vited the partnership to which we refer, and which, after some honorable 
scruples, was, at last, politely accepted. By an arrangement between 
the parties of their respective branches of labor, the subject under our 
pen was placed in a position which, whilst it best suited his disposition 
and his particular learning, gave him a fine field for the exercise and 
display of his surpassing talents and abilities in the higher departments 
of jurisprudence. To his care was assigned, by a joint and cordial con- 
sent, all the service in the Courts of Chancery and in the Supreme 
Court, and to his partner the business of the common law courts — 
state and federal — together with the financial duties and adjustments 
of their office, and the task of their correspondence, at home and abroad, 
commensurate in its extent with nearly all the commercial litigation of 
half the state. 

We do not intend to report, in further detail, the history of this long 
partnership, and only stop to add, that the parties harmonized and 
prospered for many years ; one of them — studiously and exclusively 
pursuing his profession — continued to gather, all the time, fresh laurels 
and higher renown ; whilst the other, more flexible in his resolutions — 
we write by permission and without offence — was too frequently won 
away by the whisperings of his own political ambition, or by the flat- 
tering and seductive persuasions of the popular tongue. The former, 
we know, does not repent his prudence — the latter will not say, per- 
haps, that he was overwisc. Their destinies — though they are both 
happily content in their present fortunes — differ widely, and in the con- 
trast, their best friends may judge between them which of the two has 
most reason to rejoice in the policy or the good sense that caused those 
•diverging movements in their several lives. But naturally and sincere- 
ly averse, as the able and virtuous citizen of our text has ever been to 
public honor and service, his name, twice in his time, has been sus- 
pended at the hustings — once, without his knowledge or consent, and, 
again, after a long interval, when, in an important crisis in our state 
legislation, he yielded reluctant obedience to a call, which, under the 



FRANCIS BRINLEY FOGG, OF TENNESSEE. 675 

circumstances, he could not properly disregard. On both of these oc- 
casions, his popularity — founded solely on his great abilities and his 
acknowledged integrity — carried him triumphantly through the polls, 
and, in the first instance, considerably ahead of time-honored and influ- 
ential competitors, and that, too, without a serious effort on his part; 
for, contrary to our custom here, and the uniform practice of candidates, 
he never went out of his way to seek favor and support, and only ad- 
dressed the people when he was occasionally, but rarely, called up in 
the large assemblies that sometimes convened in Nashville during a 
political canvass. 

It was thus, that, in 1834, he was a member of the convention that 
framed the present constitution of Tennessee, and it was thus, too, that 
within the last twelve months he has served his county and its wealthy 
and enlightened metropolis in the senatorial branch of our state legisla- 
ture. In both situations he exalted his own high character, and was 
honored and distinguished by all men of every party for his great learn- 
ing and integrity, and for the profound and practical wisdom he dis- 
played on all questions under consideration and debate in those impor- 
tant assemblies. If he ever set any particular value on his own ser- 
vices or his influence in either of those situations, his native delicacy 
has not suffered him, we are sure, to whisper the silent compliment to 
his own bosom. But all who have noticed his acts, and witnessed the 
diligence, the thought and the judgment he daily manifested in dis- 
charging his official duties, will join us in saying, that by his knowledge, 
and by the confidence and admiration with which he inspired his com- 
peers, he was chiefly instrumental in engrafting on our jurisprudence 
many important and beneficial reforms. He has never failed, indeed, 
everywhere to laugh at, condemn and assault the idle forms, the bar- 
barisms, the fictions, and all the learned nonsense and jargon of the old 
law, and, we dare say, he heartily rejoices now in the deadly blows he 
has successfully dealt upon these insufferable relics of a darker or more 
designing age. But we must hasten to the close of a memoir already 
drawn beyond its intended limits. 

Mr. Fogg, as our readers will have observed, is approaching the 
conclusion of his 57th period ; but a sound constitution, fortified and 
strengthened by a habit of strictest temperance in all the pleasures and 
good things of the world, give him a hopeful guarantee of lengthened 
years. He inherits this promise, indeed, from a long-lived ancestry, 
and is not likely, we are sure, to forfeit or endanger his chances on life 
by an imprudent act, or by an undue indulgence that would be calcu- 
lated to impair his health, or shorten the number of his days. In sta- 
ture he is about five feet seven inches in height, of a vigorous and ro- 
tund frame, with a quiet, pleasing and benign countenance, and a light 
gray eye, which, though it does not sufficiently herald his extraordinary 
intellect, evidences deep and deliberate thought and great reflection. 
Nevertheless, that eye readily beams an approving smile, or drops a 
sympathetic tear. It always sparkles brightly under joyous or plea- 
surable emotions, and is altogether unused to bitter, scornfiil or indig- 
nant looks. The marked lines in his face, and his blanched locks, indi- 
cate more years than he has passed ; but care and great sorrows fre- 
quently leave their indelible impress, and alter or relax, without fatally 



676 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

weakening the faculties of the mind, or the muscular powers of the 
body. 

Of these cares and sorrows, our good friend has, of late years, tasted 
deep and felt much. Called, in a sudden and an unexpected hour, 
to mourn, in an early manhood, the loss of a noble, generous and ac- 
complished son — the senior of three only children — wise and learned, 
as he was, beyond his tender age — beloved by the old — beloved and 
honored by the young, and full of all good promises as to the future — 
his disconsolate father had scarcely ceased to weep over an object too 
well loved ever to be forgotten, when, in an hour quite as sudden and 
overwhelming, the " ancel of death" stood again at his door. An only 
daughter, lovely, and of rare endowments and abilities, the fairest and 
brightest jewel of his heart — praised, and everywhere courted and 
caressed — a sweet rose of the spring in its early and most delicious 
bloom — sank to an untimely grave, leaving one only remaining child 
to comfort his grief or desolation, by holding up a solitary but d-ear 
and hopeful light in the house of mourning. That he should, for 
a time, languish and repine under these great afflictions, was to be 
expected of a father so full of kindness and affection ; but Heaven, 
we are assured, in all due time " tempers the breeze to the shorn 
lamb ;" and we rejoice to know that the wounds which bowed a strong 
man to the earth are gradually healing, though the scars thereof can 
never be effaced. 

We have said before, that this excellent man is, in his general man- 
ner and bearing, habitually quiet and unobtrusive. But this, we must 
now add, is only his every-day out-ofdoor dress; for those who know 
him best will testify to his warm feelings, his generous and noble dis- 
position, and to the happy and interesting fervor which, in a circle of 
cherished and confiding friends, oftentimes turns his natural and ac- 
customed gravity into sounds of joyous mirth, or accents of animated 
and highly excited colloquy. In such scenes he delights in the sportive 
and well-told anecdote, or unconsciously rising from his seat, he lec- 
tures and enlightens his small audience with vehement learning, on any 
topic that may be started. Nor does his authoritative manner, on these 
occasions, prove against him either vanity or presumption. No man 
condemns these unworthy vices more than he does — no man is more 
free from their hateful practice. Such, indeed, is the gentleness and 
simplicity of his heart, that he never manifests a feeling of pride or su- 
periority, but seems, in the eyes of every one, to be the only person 
who is ignorant of his own acknowledged and commanding powers. 
And in this respect, we must pause to say, he imitates the finest ex- 
ample of true greatness — for, it may be well repeated, that nothing 
more conclusively shows a want of true merit and greatness, than a 
vain assumption of these rare and inestimable endowments. 

In his speeches at the bar, and everywhere else, he is clear, cogent 
and methodical, and never injures by dilating an argument. He labors 
to convince the mind, and seldom attempts the passions or the imagina- 
tions of men — hence he is always forcible, terse and succinct. But 
hurried away by his feelings, we have seen him, at times, rise to the 
sublimity of real eloquence ; and, long or short as his speeches may be, 
his audience — always charmed with his wisdom and evident sincerity — 



FRANCIS BRINLEY FOGG, OF TENNESSEE. 6*7 7 

adhere in silence to his accents, and never fail to seize with avidity the 
last words that fall from his lips. 

Such is the short but faithful history of the subject of this memoir — 
such his virtues and his learning — such the traits of his amiable and 
unblemished personal character — and, as such, he is, and we can 
truly add, without an enemy to mar or interrupt his peace and happi- 
ness. Many may equal — all should emulate — but none can rival, or 
excel his worth. 




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ARCHIBALD WILLIAMS, OF ILLINOIS. 679 



HON. ARCHIBALD WILLIAMS, 

OF QUINCT, ILLINOIS. 

The subject of the present sketch is one of those men whose talents 
and acquirements, no less than the integrity and virtue of his character, 
entitle him to a wider fame than he has hitherto attained. While for 
many years he has stood without a superior, as a statesman and a jurist, 
in the estimation of the people of his own state, he is comparatively 
unknown to the public beyond its limits. His political opinions, placing 
him in opposition to the dominant party iti the state, have always ex- 
cluded him from the field of national politics ; and his remoteness 
from the great theatres of forensic display has equally deprived 
him of opportunities for gaining the professional distinction which is so 
justly his due. 

Archibald Williams was born in Montgomery county, Kentucky, on 
the 10th day of June, 1801, of a family neither rich nor distinguished, 
but holding a respectable place in the good opinion of their friends and 
neighbors. The personal worth of his parents is attested by the excel- 
lent moral training which they bestowed upon a large family of sons 
and daughters. Beyond this, and the first rudiments of education which 
a country school afforded, they had nothing to give their children ; and, 
with this preparation for the battle of life, Mr. Williams, at a very early 
age, left the shelter of the paternal roof to take his part in the struggle. 

For several years, at first by manual labor, and afterwards by teach- 
ing school, he supported himself, devoting all his leisure hours to his 
own cultivation and improvement. His inclination led him to solid 
reading, and especially to the study of the law, as the profession of his 
future life. A capacity for patient and persevering labor, which few 
possess in the same degree, enabled him to overcome all obstacles, and 
he was admitted to the bar in Tennessee in 1828. 

In 1829 he removed to Illinois, and settled at Quincy, on the Mis- 
sissippi. Now it is a flourishing city. Then it was an obscure village, 
just struggling into life, on the verge of the white settlements in that 
fertile region, between the Illinois and Mississippi rivers. " The 
Bounty Land Tract," as it is often called, soon became one of the great 
centres of attraction to emigrants : the El Dorado of the day, as the 
Scioto and the Wabash valleys had been before it ; and as Iowa, Ore- 
gon, and California have been since. Its population was multiplied, 
and its resources developed, with a rapidity unexampled elsewhere than 
in America. Mr, Williams was not long in acquiring the esteem and 
regard of the early settlers ; and, with the growth of the country, his 
acquaintance became daily more extended, and his reputation constantly 
increased. In the course of six or eight years, his services at the bar 
and in the state senate had already ranked him, by common consent, 
among the ablest men in the state. 

Mr. Williams was three times elected to the legislature, serving one 
term in the senate, and two terms in the lower house. He was also a 
member of the convention of 1847, which framed the present constitu- 



680 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

tion of the state. In the discharge of these public trusts, his ability and 
zeal for the public good won for him the respect and confidence, no 
less of his political opponents, than of his associates. By the latter he 
was twice complimented with their votes for the Senate of the United 
States. 

His professional reputation is high, and securely established. Con- 
troversies about land titles, which, perhaps more than all others, task 
the learning and acuteness of the lawver, have not been wanting in the 
Western States. And, although the admirable system adopted for the 
survey and sale of the public lands has cut off much of the litigation 
which grew out of conflicting surveys in the older states, yet other 
sources of difficulty, scarcely less fruitful, have been opened in the early 
legislation of Illinois. Of these, the most prominent are the laws of 
the sale of delinquent lands for taxes, and the statutes of limitation, 
commonly called the occupying claimant laws. The construction and 
application of these statutes have developed a variety of questions, 
which demanded research and skill for their solution ; among them, 
some of the highest importance, springing out of the state and federal 
constitutions, and the fundamental principles of the common law. It is 
not too much to say, that Mr. Williams' share in the argument of these 
questions, and the originality, vigor, and breadth of his views, have 
commanded the admiration of his cotemporaries, and identified him 
with the history of the jurisprudence of the state. 

In the other branches of the law, diversified in their o^vn nature, and 
constantly adapting themselves to the new interests and wants of soci- 
ety, he has maintained an equal place. His mind is clear, logical, and 
remarkable for its power of penetrating through all that is superficial to 
the very bottom of the subject. While others are assailing battlement 
and tower, he works his way by sap and mine to the very corner-stone 
of his adversary's position, and, with one great effort, hurls the whole 
fabric to the ground. He is thoroughly versed in what may be called 
the. geology o^ law — the wide, deep, elementary principles of all juris- 
prudence — and especially in those of the common law of England, the 
basis of our own institutions. He possesses none of the graces of elo- 
cution, no brilliant fancies, no flowers of rhetoric ; but, when roused by 
the importance of his subject, or animated by a cause which moves his 
his own feelings, his earnestness and force swell into true eloquence, and 
sway the most unwilling mind into conviction. 

Our present business with Mr, Williams is professional. This is not 
the occasion to speak, except incidentally, of his private character. But 
we may be pardoned for saying that, in the large circle of his relatives 
and friends, his distinction as a lawyer and a statesman forms the least 
of his claims to their reverence and affection. 

He fills at present the office of United States attorney for the dis- 
trict of Illinois, to which he was appointed two or three years ago. and 
the duties of which he discharges with equal usefulness to the public, 
and honor to himself One of his written opinions, touching certain 
public lands near Chicago, came officially under the review of the pre- 
sent attorney-general, about a year since, and was approved by that 
.able and accomplished jurist, with a marked acknowledgment of its 
ability and completeness. 




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OF ILLINOIS, 681 



HON. DAVID M. WOODSON, 

OF ILLIKOIB. 

" Si quereretur, quUnatn jurUeomvitus vere nominaretur, eum dic»rem qui Usrum et 
eon$uetud,nis ejus, qui privati in eivUate utererUur, ft adretpondendum, et ad agendum, 
et ad carendum, peritus e*t. " — Cicero, De Or., i 4S. 

Perhaps the most difficult of all literary tasks is to wnte an unex- 
ceptionable memoir of a living man. If the life is worth the record, 
there is always danger of offending that delicacy which is inseparable 
from merit ; for even modern praise, which may meet the eyes of its 
subject, is apt to seem fulsome ; while a nice sense of propriety would 
not be the less wounded by a dry abstract, which would contain noth- 
ing but names and dates. To sum up a career, too, which is not yet 
ended, would appear like recording events which have not transpired ; 
since, justly to estimate the scope and meaning of a history, it is most 
important that we have the closing chapter. In writing such a bio- 
graphical notice, therefore, the chronicler, from the moment he takes up 
his pen, should consider his subject as no longer among his contempo- 
raries : for thus he will avoid the fear of offending, by bestowing praise 
where it is merited, and escape the risk of giving but a fragmentary 
view of that which must eventually be taken as a unit. 

These difficulties are more formidable in the case of a civilian than 
of a military man : for the story of the latter is told by simple refer- 
ence to events which all the world is sure to know — the significance of 
half a lifetime is compressed within a day ; an hour's intense action lays 
bare the thoughts and combinations of many weeks ; and the result is 
embodied in round numbers of lives sacrificed, bodies mangled, and 
rights trampled. But with the civilian, the case is far different : his 
victories are the nobler triumphs of peace— calm, healthful, deep and 
unobtrusive, they must be enlarged upon, in order to be appreciated. 
And especially is this true of him, whose usefulness flows through the 
channels of the law, — whos6 duty it is to hold the scales of justice, and 
amid the irritations and distractions of forensic battles, to preserve un- 
clouded both his reason and his sense of right. There is supposed to be 
no heroism in this, because men will seldom praise anything which 
does not challenge admiration by obtrusive glitter and vain trumpet- 
ing ; but in proportion as moral courage is a higher quality than physical 
impulse, so is the triumph of the just judge nobler than the victory which 
writes itself in blood, 

Hon. David Meade Woodson (judge of the first judicial circuit, in 
the State of Illinois) was born in the county of Jessamine, Kentucky, 
on the eighteenth day of May, 180G; and is, therefore, but forty-six 
years of age. His father was Samuel H. Woodson, Esq., a lawyer of 
eminence even among the distinguished men who then illustrated the bar 



682 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

of Kentucky. He was a law-student of the celebrated George Nicho- 
las, and was a cotemporary of Henry Clay, William T. Barry, William 
Logan, Jesse Bledsoe, Robert Wickliffe, John Rowan, and other re- 
markable men of Kentucky's brightest period. A gentleman of polished 
address, various acquirements, and great personal popularity, he re- 
peatedly represented the county of Jessamine in the state legislature, 
and in 1820 was elected from the Ashland district to Congress. He 
died in 1827, aged about fifty years. 

He was a native of Albemarle county, in Virginia, whence he was 
brought to Kentucky by his mother and step-father, (Col. Joseph Crocket, 
an officer of distinction in the war of the Revolution,) when he was seven 
years of age. On the first day of January, 1804, he married Ann R. 
Meade, the daughter of Col. David Meade, who had settled, at a very 
early day, at a place about nine miles south of Lexington, in (what is now) 
the county of Jessamine. His mansion [Chaumier du Prairie) was 
long celebrated as the seat of elegant and hearty hospitality — while its 
master was renowned, even among the men of that time, for his polish- 
ed and graceful manners, extensive reading, and refined taste. 

By this marriage, David Meade, the subject of this sketch, was the 
second son ; and it was amid such associations as these, that his early 
youth was passed. Having spent some years at classical schools in the 
neighborhood of Lexington, and a short time at Transylvania University, 
he was, at the age of seventeen, placed under the tuition of the celebra- 
ted Jesse Bledsoe, then one of the professors in the law-school of that 
institution — securing, thus, the advantage of daily intercourse with one of 
the acutest minds of the country. The remainder of the term, devoted 
to preparation in the law, was spent in the office of his father, who was 
commendably anxious that his son should be thoroughly armed for the 
contests to which his vocation destined him. 

In 1827, however, his father died ; an event which devolved upon 
the young lawyer and his brother the arduous and perplexing duty of 
settling up an extensive and complicated estate — while their widowed 
mother (who is yet living) and seven minor children looked up to the 
two brothers as their natural protectors. These circumstances, and the 
new duties and responsibilities thus suddenly imposed upon him, in a 
great measure withdrew the future jurist's attention from his profession 
for several years ; and it was not until his brothers and sisters had been 
educated and prepared for their various walks in life, that he was 
enabled to return to a study to which he had always been strongly at- 
tached. The voluntary devotement of so many years of his life, by 
one who was looking eagerly forward to an honorable distinction — to 
be gained through a profession thus thrown aside — is a sacrifice which 
few men are capable of making, but which, for its self-denial, is above 
all praise. 

In 1831, when but a few days past the age of eligibility required by 
the Constitution, he was brought forward, by zealous and partial friends, 
to represent his native county in the state legislature. It was a peculiarly 
interesting period — a sort of local political crisis. The county had been 
largely democratic; but, year after year, the whigs had been gaining 
ground, until, at the time above mentioned, it was supposed that a 
strong whig candidate might complete the revolution. It was a flatter 



DAVID M. WOODSON, OP ILLINOIS. 683 

ing index to Mr. Woodson's standing anaong his fellow-citizens that he 
was chosen, at this juncture, as the standard-bearer of his party. His 
competitor was one of the most popular and estimable of the many 
prominent democrats of the county ; selected, like his young opponent, 
with special reference to the crisis. 

It was remarkable then — and a like circumstance would be still more 
so now — that both parties passed through the canvass without display- 
ing any of that virulent and reckless disregard of private character which 
so often disgraces warm political contests. The candidates themselves 
were upon the most cordial terms ; and though each felt it to be his 
duty to defeat the other, if he might, neither was inclined to compass 
that end by other than the most honorable means. 

A small majority crowned the efforts of the whigs; and, I believe, 
that in no election since that year has a democrat been returned from 
the county. The value of the victory was enhanced by the youth and 
inexperience of the leader ; and the enthusiasm which, among the warm 
hearts of Kentucky is always so ready to overflow, was manifested on 
this occasion in a manner which, among people less demonstrative, 
would be deemed somewhat extravagant. Amid shouts of exultation, 
and manifestations of extreme joy, the youthful legislator was borne in 
triumph through all the streets of the village upon the shoulders of his 
neighbors — an incident which, outre and irregular as it may appear to 
colder temperaments, at least attests the warmth and sincerity of 
men's convictions. 

Within a few days after taking his seat in the legislature — the 
youngest man in that body — he cast one of the votes which sent Henry 
Clay to the United States Senate; an act to which — now that that 
honored statesman is in the grave, at the close of a career of noble and 
patriotic usefulness — he may look back with pride and pleasure, not 
unmingled with melancholy. 

In the same year of his election, on the sixth of October, he married 
Miss Lucy McDowell, sister of Dr. McDowell, (a physician and sur- 
geon of considerable eminence, resident in St. Louis,) and daughter of 
Major John McDowell, of Fayette county, Kentucky. During the 
autumn of the following year, (1833,) after the close of his term as re- 
presentative, he visited Illinois, for the first time; and having selected 
CarroUton, in Greene county, as his future home, returned to Kentucky 
to complete his arrangements for emigration. The next year found 
him settled for life, at the capital of one of the richest agricultural 
counties of a state which has no equal, in fertility, in the Union. 

Here he resumed the practice of the law, in connection with Charles 
D. Hodges, Esq., who had, like Mr. Woodson, but recently emigrated 
to CarroUton. And it may be noted, as illustrative of the character 
which has distinguished the subject of this sketch, as well as Mr. 
Hodges, that, in the shifting relations of the west, the cases are exceed- 
ingly rare in which a partnership has continued so long and so per- 
fectly free from discord. The peculiar constitution of western society, 
the endless changes brought about by immigration, the connection of 
almost every western lawyer with political interests, and the nature of 
the profession itself, all tend to shorten the duration of legal partner- 
ships. But, in spite of these things — and I dwell upon the circumstance, 



684 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

because it is so honorable to both parties — this association endured, 
without a single serious difference, for nnore than fourteen years ; and. 
even at the end of that time, was only terminated of necessity by the 
election of Mr. Woodson to a judgeship, in 1848. 

But few lawyers of this state have been more successful ; none have 
borne a higher character for probity or refined professional honor. 
Having the acuteness — which, unfortunately, all lawyers do not pos- 
sess — to discriminate between the promptings of obstinacy and the 
honest assertion of justice, with a sincere desire to discourage the one 
and support the other, they safely acted upon the principle of declining 
all causes whose institution was of doubtful propriety. They never 
suffered their minds to be tinged with the prejudices or petty resent- 
ments of their clients, and were always manly enough to rebuke, even 
in their friends, the vexatious spirit, of litigation. It was, doubtless, 
their practice, in this particular, which suggested the compliment so often 
bestowed upon them, as exceptions to the supposed rule of their profes- 
sion, that they gave honest advice, without reference to the foregone 
conclusions of those who asked it. 

In the autumn of 1835, Mr. Woodson returned to Kentucky, and 
spent another session in the Law School of Transylvania University — 
then under the management of the Hon. George Robertson, chief-jus- 
tice of Kentucky. Having graduated with honor, he sought again the 
field in which his laurels were to be won. But a short time had 
elapsed, however, before misfortune began to oppress him, in a manner 
hard to be borne. The health of his wife had been gradually impaired ; 
and soon after his return to Illinois, it became evident that, if she 
would again visit the scenes of her childhood, and see the friends of 
her youth, no time was to be lost. In a scale containing such con- 
siderations as this, professional or political aspirations could have no 
weight. He at once set out for Kentucky, where, in August, 1836, 
the companion of his earlier years, and the mother of his only child, 
breathed her last, amid the familiar scenes of her own and her husband's 
youth. 

An event like this, always a deep affliction even to the most callous, 
to one full — as was Mr. Woodson — of all human and tender sympa- 
thies, was a blow at the foundation of happiness. For a considerable 
period he was wholly disqualified for the business of life. Time, how- 
ever, the great healer of wounds, finally brought him relief; and, having 
mastered the gloom of his spirits, on the first day of November, 1838, 
he was again married to Miss J ulia Kennett, daughter of Dixon H. 
Kennett, Esq., formerly of Kentucky. It was not until the following 
winter that the obstacles and interruptions which had broken and im- 
peded his progress were at last removed ; and a career, which has been 
eminently honorable, was at last seriously commenced. 

At the session of the legislature of 1838-9, he was elected to the office 
of State's Attorney, to fill a vacancy in which he had recently been ap- 
pointed by Governor Duncan. He continued to discharge the duties 
of his station until August, 1840, when he was elected, by the people 
of Greene county, to a seat in the legislature ; a success which was the 
more flattering from the fact that it was obtained by a whig, in a county 
which usually gave from four to five hundred democratic majority. 



DAVID M. WOODSON, OF ILLINOIS. 685 

Though strenuously opposed by the dominant party, headed by their 
Strongest men, he was elected by a handsome majority ; and though 
the contest had been a bitter and virulent one, none, even of those who 
opposed the choice, ever oppugned the integrity and patriotism of the 
new legislator's course. 

But the ways of politics were not the paths in which his nature best 
fitted him to walk — the violence of party contests was far from grate- 
ful to his quiet spirit; and his tastes were better gratified among the 
regulated scenes of his profession than in the bickerings of faction ur the 
petty jealousies of office. In 1843, however, he was nominated by the 
whigs of the fifth district (of which Greene county forms a part) to a 
seat in Congress. But it was his fortune to be opposed by the Hon. 
Stephen A. Douglas, now so prominently before the people for the pre- 
sidency. The great personal and political popularity of the latter carried 
him triumphantly through the contest ; and Mr. Woodson, to the great 
joy of his true friends, was reserved for pursuits both more congenial 
and more useful. 

In 1847, the people of Greene county, without distinction of party, 
elected him to a seat in the convention called to amend the state con- 
stitution ; and though men differ — and justly may differ — about the 
propriety of many provisions in the instrument then framed, it is due 
to Judge W. to say, that he opposed, with zeal and constancy, those 
features which have since been found most obnoxious. He strove 
especially, with many of the most enlightened members of that body, 
against the empiricism which made the result of the convention — in- 
stead of a well guarded but sufficiently liberal declaration of funda- 
mental principles, as a constitution should be — a farrago of details, 
special enactments, doubtful experiments, and " penny-w^ise" economy. 
Unfortunately for the interests of the state, there was, in an assembly 
otherwise respectable enough, a combination of political tinkers — men 
who emerged from obscurity only to spoil what was good, and to 
make worse what was already bad — and the consequence has been, 
that, in the opinion of a majority of the bar, the pri-mary law of our 
state is, in tone and dignity, scarcely above the municipal regulations 
of a petty corporate town. Judge Woodson has reason to be thankful 
that the clearness of his views kept him free from all responsibility in 
the matter. 

After his return from the convention, he devoted himself assiduously 
to his profession, until the autumn of 1848; when, upon the approach 
of the first judicial election under the new constitution, the general sen- 
timent of the first circuit pointed to him as the most proper person to 
fill the post of circuit judge. It was naturally expected that the ques- 
tion would be made a political one ; and, had it been so, the bench would 
have been occupied by a democrat — that party possessing a majority 
in the circuit of from ten to fifteen hundred. 

In filling judicial offices, however, the people (whatever bitterness of 
political rancor may actuate them, in circumstances where such con- 
siderations are properly admitted) are always prepared to defend and 
protect their own best interests. It is of vital importance to the citi- 
zens of any country, that the laws should be faithfully and intelligently 
administered ; and even the wisest enactments are worse than useless, 



686 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

unless executed with impartiality, consistency and ability. Bad laws 
may be rendered less injurious by able and merciful judges ; while ig- 
norant or corrupt officers may, and often do, extract oppression and in- 
justice from wholesome regulations. In every view, then, it is indis- 
pensable that we fill the judicial offices of the country with the most 
competent men, of whatsoever political party they may be — a truth, in 
which the people of the first judicial circuit manifested their faith, on the 
occasion of which we are writing. 

Though opposed by able men, backed by the sanction of a party con- 
vention, Mr. Woodson was triumphantly elected — a result which he 
owed to the conviction, since then so well justified, that independently 
of partisan considerations, he was eminently well qualified for the post 
to which he was elevated. Since that time, having become accustomed 
to the ermine, he has continued to the present day, discharging the (in 
the west) onerous and somewhat irregular duties of presiding judge of 
a populous district ; and we but express the sentiment of the bar and 
of the country when we add, with high honor to himself and advantage 
to the people, over whose interests he has so much influence. Having 
at first no experience in his new functions, he adapted himself to them 
with a gracious vigor which belongs only to minds peculiarly fitted for 
such effort, and he has gone on winning, year after year, " golden opin- 
ions from all sorts of men" — impressing even the hard critics of the 
bar with his independence, ability and impartiality. The character 
which he has thus secured for himself, though his life should close now, 
would be ample reward for years of labor, and a rich heritage to his 
children. 

In all the stations which he has been called upon to fill, no word of 
reproach or suspicion has ever been cast upon his name. His firmness 
is equal to his integrity : and of all others, this is the quality most 
necessary to a judge who has to deal with the turbulent and free-speak- 
ing lawyers of the west. Patience, tempered by a watchful sense of 
propriety — ^judgment, seasoned by many years of experience at the 
bar — and frankness, always ready to do justice to honest opinions, are 
among his most valuable characteristics. When we add to these the 
most untiring diligence in the examination and decision of questions 
submitted to his determination, we complete a character eminently 
worthy to be placed among the distinguished jurists of our countr}'. and 
close, for the present, our notice of a life which gives rich promise of a 
long career of usefulness. 




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HBNRT BUTTON, OF CONNECTICUT. 687 



HON. HENRY DUTTON. 

OF NBW-HAVEN, CONNECTICUT. 

The subject of this memoir was born in Litchfield county, Connec- 
ticut, February 12, 1796. His paternal grandfather. Deacon Thomas 
Dutton, was engaged in actual service as a captain in the war of the 
Revolution. His father also, though a minor, was for a short time in 
the army. His mother was a lineal descendant from John Punderson, 
one of the seven pillars of the church first established in New-Haven. 
His success furnishes an illustration of the practical equality that exists 
in this country, and of the reward that uniformly repays industry and 
perseverance. From childhood until the age of sixteen, he was en- 
gaged, except while attending a district school, in assisting his father in 
the cultivation of a small farm. This gave him a vigor of constitution, 
which has never failed in the most severe trials of a laborious profession. 
It gave him also a familiar acquaintance with the virtues and vices, the 
passions and prejudices, the acquirements and capabilities, of that por- 
tion of the community which has been aptly called the bone and sinew 
of the body politic. The knowledge thus acquired has been of essential 
service to him, both at the bar and in the halls of legislation. It enabled 
him also, in after life, to appreciate and enjoy the works of Virgil, Theo- 
critus, and others, who have so beautifully and accurately described 
the employments and pleasures of rural life. 

From early youth he has been fond of reading and study, and this 
inclination was fostered and encouraged by his father, a man of strong 
natural powers of mind, who felt severely the want of early advantages. 
He was induced to attempt the arduous task of acquiring, without 
pecuniary resources, the benefits of a liberal education, by the encour- 
agement and example of the late Rev. Aaron Dutton, at his death one 
of the Socii of Yale College, and of his brother, the late M. R. Dutton, 
Professor of Mathematics and Natural Philosophy in the same institu- 
tion. From the age of sixteen to twenty, by interchangeably keeping 
school, studying, and laboring on the farm, he qualified himself for ad- 
mission to the junior class in Yale College. In 1818 he graduated with 
the highest honors that could be awarded on such an advanced admis- 
sion. The only pecuniary aid of any amount which he received was a 
legacy from a maternal uncle of one hundred dollars. He left college, 
therefore, considerably in debt ; but he immediately took charge of the 
academy in Fairfield, which enabled him to liquidate this, and qualify 
himself for admission to the bar. He prosecuted his legal studies un- 
der the tuition of Hon. R. M. Sherman, whose friendship he enjoyed 
until his death, and whose memory he cherishes as that of one of the 
brightest ornaments of the profession. By him Mr. Dutton was carried 
back to the fountains of jurisprudence, and taught to regard Coke upon 
Littleton as a text-book, and to read Feme on Contingent Remainders 
by way of amusement. 

From 1821 to 1823 he was a tutor in Yale College, at the close of 



688 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

which engagement he established hlnnself at Newtown, in Fairfield 
county, Connecticut. In the course of a few months he married Eliza- 
beth E. Joy, daughter of Captain M. Joy, and granddaughter of Rev. 
Andrew Eliot, of Boston. As the " first fruits" of the profession were 
wholly insufficient for the support of a family, he made up the deficiency 
by taking charge of a number of young men, some of whom had 
been under the care of Captain Partridge, at Middletown, and others 
had " leave of absence" from Yale College. This, for several years, con- 
tinued his familiarity with clasbical studies, and relieved the tedium 
usually experienced in commencing practice. After remaining fourteen 
years in Newtown, and becoming well established in business, he re- 
moved to Bridgeport, in the same county. He continued there, in full 
practice, ten years, when he received the appointment of Professor of 
Law in Yale College, and, as an associate with the Hon. C. Bissell, suc- 
ceeded the Hon. S. J. Hitchcock and Hon. J. H. Townsend in the 
charge of Yale Law School, which position he now occupies — although 
he is still engaged, to a considerable extent, in professional business. 
When Mr. D. began to practise law, he enjoyed the opportunity of wit- 
nessing some of the finest exhibitions of legal science and skill that have 
ever been displayed in the state, not to say in the country. The late 
Judge Daggett and Hon. Nathan Smith were then in the prime of life, 
and regularly attended the courts in Fairfield county. Here they met, 
or were associated with, Hon. R. M. Sherman, Hon. S. B. Sherwood, 
and Hon. C. Bissell, and subsequently the Hon. T. Betts, whose early 
death, when U. S. Senator, extinguished a brilliant genius as well as 
logical intellect. The contests of these intellectual gladiators could not 
be witnessed without interest and improvement. 

After those distinguished men, by death or otherwise, ceased from 
their labors in the profession, and especially since the lamented death of 
the late Hon. R. Booth, of Danbury, Mr. D. has been employed in 
almost all the important cases in Fairfield county, aod has practised to 
a considerable extent in other counties in the state. 

He was for several years attorney for the state for the county of Fair- 
field, and has been judge of the New-Haven County Court. 

Mr. D. has been repeatedly called upon to lend his aid in modifying 
and improving the statute laws of the state. He has been five times a 
member of the House of Representatives — twice from Newtown, twice 
from Bridgeport, and once from New-Haven — and has been once a 
member of the State Senate, In 1847, he was appointed, in connection 
with Hon. L. P. Waldo and F. Fellowes, Esq., a commissioner to make 
a new revision of the statutes — they had not been revised since 182L 
This work required of the commissioners a great amount of care and 
labor in expunging and correcting obsolete and careless phraseology, in 
incorporating acts passed since the last revision, and separating matters 
which had been improperly joined, and in reducing the whole to a sys- 
tematic arrangement. The result of their labors was approved of by 
the legislature of 1848, was published in 1849, and has given general 
satisfaction. Among the particular laws which he has been instru- 
mental in having passed, is the act allowing, in civil cases, all persons, 
of sufficient age and capacity, to testify. This has been considered bj 
some a measure of doubtfiil policy, at least so far as parties are con- 



HKNRT DUTTON, OF CONNECTICUT. 689 

cerned ; but Mr. D. holds that it promotes the investigation of truth, and 
relieves the law from the gross inconsistency of the rule allowing witnesses 
to testify under the strongest bias — from affection, relationship, party 
spirit, revenge, loss of reputation, and interest in fact, while it excludes 
a person who has only a nominal interest, and who frequently is preju- 
diced in favor of the adverse party, merely because he is a party to the 
record. In his opinion, much more danger of perjury is to be appre- 
hended from other influences than from that of mere pecuniary interest. 
He was also in favor of the law adopted in 1850, of giving to the coun- 
sel for a prisoner the right of a closing argument to the jury. 

He thought that a person accused of a crime ought to have an oppor- 
tunity of explaining satisfactorily, if he can, not only what is proved, 
but also what is said to his prejudice ; and that, if the honesty and can- 
dor of the counsel for the prosecution can, in all cases, be safely relied 
upon to protect the prisoner from misstatements of testimony, and 
false and unfounded inferences from admitted or established facts, their 
zeal, at least, needs to be guarded against. 

He favored a reform in pleading, so far, at least, as to allow in all 
actions one form of the general issue, and to require that all special 
matter should be pleaded specially, or that notice should be given of it 
under the general issue. 

He was in favor, also, of a law, that in actions ex contractu the 
plaintiff shall be permitted to obtain judgment against one or more of 
several defendants, when he cannot sustain his case against all. 

He introduced a bill, which was adopted, giving to the superior 
court sole jurisdiction of all cases of divorce, thereby relieving the legis- 
lature of a mass of business that had become a nuisance and reproach. 

He aided also in the passage of a bill, prepared by the Hon. T. B. 
Butler, of Norwalk, and several other bills, securing more effectually 
the rights of married women. 

In 1848, with the assistance of N. A. Cowdrey, Esq., he published a 
revision of the first volume of Swift's Digest, and is now revising the 
second volume, in which will be introduced a Treatise on Connecticut 
Practice, and a large number of new forms. 

As a politician he has always been a decided whig. His Hither was 
a Jeffersonian democrat, while his other relatives, when he was -young, 
chiefly belonged to the old federal party. This gave him an opportunity 
of listening to discussions of party principles, and witnessing manifes- 
tations of party feeling, which make all modern demonstrations appear 
to him like mere child's play. Under these influences he grew up with 
an instinctive abhorrence of aristocratical feelings and distinctions. But 
he has never been able to discover how the denunciation of the rich 
tends to ameliorate the condition of the poor, nor how bread is to be 
provided for the hungry by paralyzing business and enterprise. This 
has led him, as a legislator, to support bills chartering banks whenever 
clearly shown to be demanded by the necessities of commerce or manu- 
factures, believing that they enable integrity and energy to compete 
successfally with influence and capital. 

He is impressed with the belief that the world grows wiser as it 
grows older ; that every succeeding generation is in a situation to profit 

44 



690 SKETCHES OF KMINEKT AMERICANS. 

by the discoveries of those which have preceded it, and that a measure 
ought not, of course, to be rejected, merely because it is new. 

He unwaveringly upholds the doctrine, that all the citizens of the 
United States are bound to maintain the constitution of the United 
States in its integrity. 

The following testimonial, addressed to the Hon. C. Bissell and him- 
self, may be regarded as proof of the satisfactory manner in which he 
discharges his present duties. 

At a meeting of the students of Yale Law School, held August 28th, 
1849, the following resolutions were unanimously passed, viz: 

" Resolved, That, for careful instruction in that profession which is to 
be at once our means of support and our road to whatever of usefulness 
and distinction is our destined share in life — for kind and courteous 
treatment of us as students, and for private acts of friendship and kind- 
ness to different individuals of our brotherhood. Our hearty thanks are 
due to the professors of Yale Law School. 

" Resolved, That those of us now leaving the school, and expecting 
before long to enter on the practice of our profession, will ever look 
back to this period of our preparatory training with feelings of pleasure 
and gratitude ; and that we shall regard the time spent here, the ex- 
amples set before us of legal learning, and the high-toned and correct 
ideas of a lawyer's duties and responsibilities which we have been taught, 
as so many living pledges for efforts on our part to do in everything ac- 
cording to the full measure of our abilities and the strict requirements 
of rectitude." 



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OIDKON J. PILLOW, OP TENNESSEE. G91 



MAJOR GEN. GIDEON J. PILLOW. 

OF TENNESSEE. 

The subject of this sketch was born on the 8th day of June, 1806, 
in Williamson county, in the State of Tennessee. He was the second 
son of Gideon and Annie Pillow. John Pillow, the jrrandfather of 
General Pillow, moved to Tennessee in the year 1783, and settled 
in the present city of Nashville, in the midst of the most ferocious 
and hostile tribe of Indians, who at that day held almost undisputed 
sway over that part of the country. He had five sons — William, 
Gideon, John, Mordecai, and Abner, all of whom grew up amidst 
the hardships, perils and privations incident to the frontier settlements 
of that state. For many years they were constantly engaged in the 
Indian wars, which for so long a time retarded the settlement of that 
part of the country. These five brothers were all distinguished for 
their activity, and fearless and daring intrepidity in their conflicts with 
the Indians. Col. Wm. Pillow was greatly distinguished in the war 
of 1812, under General Jackson, and, while gallantly charging at the 
head of his regiment in the battle of Tailed ega, was shot through the 
body, from which wound he has been ever since disabled. General 
Pillow's grandfather and his brothers, and three brothers of his grand- 
mother, were all soldiers of the Revolutionary War ; the youngest of 
whom, Abner Johnson, (for many years a pensioned soldier,) died, at 
the advanced age of ninety-three, in June, 1851. Gen. Pillow's mother 
was a daughter of Josiah Payne, who was an uncle of Mrs. Madison. 

Gen. Pillow graduated at the Nashville University in 1827. Hav- 
ing selected the law as his profession, he entered immediately upon its 
study, under the direction of the Hon. W. E. Kennedy, then one of the 
judgcs'of the Circuit Court of Tennessee. After eighteen months' close 
study under Judge Kennedy, he went to the office of the Hon. W. L. 
Brown, then one of the judges of the Supreme Court of the state, 
where, after eighteen months' additional study, he was licensed by 
Judges Catron (now Justice Catron of the Supreme Court of the United 
States) and White, at that time presiding on the Supreme Bench of 
Tennessee. 

Having settled in Columbia, Tennessee, he immediately entered upon 
the practice of his profession. The bar of Columbia was at that time 
one of the ablest in the state. Gen. Pillow, by his thorough knowledge 
of his profession, obtained during three years' hard study before he was 
licensed — by strict attention to the business of his clieats — by his en- 
ergy, tact, quick perception of the true points at issue, and his almost 
intuitive knowledge of men, soon acquired the character of an able and 
successful lawyer, and in the course of ten years ranked with the first 
lawyers of his state. While he was greatly distinguished as an advo- 
cate and criminal lawyer, he shared largely in all the important litigated 
business of the portion of the state in which he resided. Avoiding all 
the seductive allurements of political life, and devoting himself with 



692 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

an energy which overcame every obstacle, an industry which enabled 
him to master every subject, his professional career was, perhaps, the 
most successful, if not the most brilliant, of that of any lawyer of his state. 

In 1844 his warm personal friendship for Mr. Polk induced him to 
depart from his accustomed pursuits, so far as to go to Baltimore as a 
delegate to the Democratic National Convention. His active partici- 
pation in that convention is known to have greatly contributed to the 
result which placed Mr. Polk before the nation. He entered warmly 
into the political canvass which followed. At a great mass-meeting 
which assembled in tTie immediate vicinity of Mr. Polk's residence, he, 
at the request of Mr. Polk, delivered a speech upon the Texas question, 
in answer to a letter of Mr. Clay's, combatting the annexation of Texas 
as a violation of international law. This argument of General Pillow 
evinced a thorough acquaintance with international law, met and refuted 
triumphantly all the positions assumed by Mr. Clay, and was distin- 
guished by great ability and research. It was published in pamphlet 
form, in great numbers, by the Democratic Association of Tennessee, 
and was extensively circulated over the country. It added greatly to 
the already high reputation of its author. 

After Mr. Polk's election. Gen. Pillow returned to his accustomed 
pursuits, neither seeking nor desiring any position in the government, 
and was found in the full and successful practice of his profession when 
he received a commission as brigadier-general in the army in the war 
with Mexico. He received his commission on the evening of the 13th 
of July, 184G ; on the morning of the 14th July he tore himself loose 
from his family and professional engagements, and proceeded directly 
to Camargo, in Mexico, the then head-quarters of the American army. 
Pie was the first general officer of the then recent appointments who re- 
ported for duty to General Taylor. By great effort and extraordinary 
energy he was enabled to carry forward with him his brigade of Tennes 
see volunteers. 

He was most ardent in his desire to go forward with General Taylor 
in the movement then about to be made upon Monterey. In this de- 
sire, however, he was sadly disappointed. The arrangements of General 
Taylor for moving on Monterey only contemplated a force of some 
6,000 men of all arms. The volunteers of the column were selected by 
lot, and organized into a field division under General Butler, with 
Quitman and Hamer for Jiis brigadiers. In consequence of the non- 
employment of the remaining troops, General Pillow was left in com 
mand of a brigade in depot at Camargo. His attention was turned to 
the instruction of his command in the duties of its new profession, and 
the establishment of an efficient discipline. Such duty as that is most 
trying on the patience and devotion of an officer, for it is that of rou- 
tine, without the stimulus of an immediate and urgent necessity for ex- 
ertion. In respect to the troops>at Camargo, the honors and fixtigues 
of the service were being gathered and undergone by other troops, 
though not all the dangers ; for the fatal diseases of an unhealthy climate 
broke out, and made as many, if not more victims than both sword 
and pestilence in the active portions of the army. Among those at- 
tacked was General Pillow, who, after lying dangerously ill for many 
weeks, became so far restored as to be able to travel. Under the sup- 



GIDEON J. PILLOW, OF TENNBSSKE. 693 

position that a period of inactivity would ensue, he made preparations to 
leave the country for the benefit of his health, and had proceeded .as far 
as the mouth of the Rio Grande. There he learned of the movement 
of the army on Victoria. He returned at once, marched from Mata- 
moras, in command of a brigade, to Victoria; and when General Scott 
dismembered Taylor's command in order to lay siege to Vera Cruz, 
Pillow marched for Tampico, there embarked, and was present at the 
landing of the American army, opposite Sacrificios, on the 9th of March, 
1847. On the following day the extension of the lines of investment 
commenced, and in the execution of this duty Pillow became first posi- 
tively engaged with the enemy. 

Worth's division of regulars having taken its ground on the right of 
the proposed line without serious opposition, Patterson was ordered to 
move his troops to their station on its left, and to the south and west of 
the city of Vera Cruz. The enemy had, however, assembled in force 
to dispute the further occupation of the line, and the general of division 
ordered Pillow to dislodge him from an old building (the hacienda Mali- 
bran) and the chaparral in its vicinity. His force was composed of 
two regiments of Tennessee, and two of Pennsylvania volunteers, and 
the report of his division-commander describes his conduct in the fol- 
lowing language : 

" A few minutes after. General Pillow, having penetrated the chapar- 
ral, encountered the Mexican infantry in the vicinity of the ruined build- 
ing, whence, after some sharp firing, he drove them with loss, one offi- 
cer and three men having been left upon the field. He now opened his 
way through the chaparral, and, pushing on with the First Tennessee 
Regiment, (Colonel Campbell's,) gained possession of the magazine, (a 
strong stone building south of the hacienda Malibran,) in which were 
found a large number of segude rockets, and one hundred and twenty 
boxes of shrapnel shot. Leaving Colonel Campbell's regiment to hold 
this point, he moved on with the Second Tennessee regiment, (Colonel 
Haskell's,) and the First Pennsylvania Regiment, (Colonel Wynkoop's,) 
against a body of cavalry and infantry occupying the rail-road at its 
intersection with the Madeline road. Here the enemy was again driven, 
and he was now pursued through a dense chaparral and over a rugged 
country to the crest of the hills southwest of the city. On these hills 
the enemy rallied and made a show of resistance ; but he was compel- 
led, as before, to retire as our troops steadily advanced, until, com- 
pletely routed, he sought shelter under the guns of the city. The two 
regiments last named, although exposed to the fire from the guns of the 
city, bivouacked on these heights." 

This, the most considerable action which occurred in the extension of 
the lines of investment at the siege of Vera Cruz, closed the operations 
of the 13th of March. The two following days the extension was com- 
pleted to Vergara, and the business of the siege commenced. 

During its continuance the subject of this memoir was occupied in 
active reconnoissance and the detail duties of his command. In the 
course of them he had a conspicuous share in the operations which re- 
sulted in the fall of that important place; and upon its commander ofTei- 
ing to capitulate, Gen. Pillow was appointed one of the commissioners 
for the negotiation of the terms, on the part of General Scott, with 



694 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

Gen. Worth and Col. Totten, Chief Engineer, and Capt. Aulick, on the 
part of the naval commander. How he performed the delicate duty 
appears from the official report of the general-in-chief, for in it he has 
said that " four more able or judicious officers could not have been de- 
sired." 

The speedy approach of the sickly season forced upon the American 
army the necessity of a prompt movement from Vera Cruz into the in- 
terior. The arrival and organization of trains of transportation was 
only awaited ; and with but little knowledge of the movements or in- 
tentions of the enemy, the advance commenced on the 9th of April. 
Twiggs' division moved on that day. and on the following Patterson's, 
under the temporary command of Pillow, followed. On the 14th, 
Gen. Scott received private dispatches informing him that the enemy 
was concentrating in force to oppose him at some point between Puente 
Nacional and Jalapa. This information v/as forwarded by special ex- 
press to the advance, but both Twiggs and Pillow had received similar 
information, and were prepared for opposition. 

None was made on the road to Plan del Rio by Gen. Santa Anna, 
who had taken post at Cerro Gordo, and was awaiting the arrival of the 
American army. The different divisions, as they came up, were halted 
at Plan del Rio, and during several days' reconuoissances were pushed 
to close vicinity of the enemy's works. The general disposition for 
the attack had been early determined upon by the general-in-chief after 
his arrival at Plan del Rio, and it was intended that Gen. Pillow should 
lead the columns against the enemy's right. 

The pass of Cerro Gordo, properly so called, extends for about a mile 
along the road, which, in that vicinity, forms an angle with the base of 
the hill of Cerro Gordo, its salient being given to the west. Within 
this angle was erected the lines of Mexican entrenchments ; three ridges 
extended from the salient of the angle towards the east, and the ex- 
tremities of each were fortified by works completely commanding the 
road, as well as by any route which might be found between it and the 
rocky banks of the Rio del Plan. The right wing of the Mexican army 
garrisoned these entrenchments, while the left was about the western 
extremity of the pass, and on the hill of Cerro Gordo, which commanded 
a view of the whole country, and all entrenchments of the Mexican posi- 
tion. Strong Mexican reserves were to the rear of the pass and Cerro 
Gordo. 

The order of battle issued by the general-in-chief on the 17th of April, 
contemplated the turning of the whole position by the right with 
Twiggs' division and Shields' brigade, while Pillow's brigade should as- 
sault the strong lines of entrenchments on the Mexican right. 

Battery No. 1, at the extremity of the ridge nearest the precipitous 
banks of El Rio del Plan, was divided from No. 2 by a ravine. No. 2 
was a strong field-work with two salients, having, besides, two com- 
manding works in the rear. The ravine which intervened between Nos. 
2 and 3 was of greater width, but the latter work was so constructed as 
to deliver a flank fire upon any force assaulting No, 2. The whole 
ground in front of the lines was of exceeding difficulty, being broken 
and rocky, and covered with a growth of tropical shrubbery ; — a serious 
impediment to any advance, and utterly precluding a distant view o 



GIDEON J. PILLOW, OF TENNESSEE. 695 

the works. General Pillow, having been informed of the probable dis- 
position of his command, had labored for several preceding days in en- 
deavoring to complete a reconnoissance, and in the performance of this 
duty several times barely escaped from the pickets of the enemy. But 
the reconnoissances could not be pushed so close as to develop all the 
defences of the Mexican position, or all the impediments to be overcome 
by an assaulting force. 

The troops which were to turn the Mexican left, having advanced 
some distance on their route on the afternoon of the 17th, and batteries 
against the different Mexican positions having been located during the 
night, the dispositions were made early on the following morning for 
the final assault. The troops of Twiggs' command were disposed to 
assault and turn Cerro Gordo, while Pillow's brigade and Worth's 
division marched from Plan del Rio, the former to take position for 
the assault, and the latter to remain in reserve. Near the mouth of the 
pass, Pillow diverged from the main road, and moved to the front of 
the Mexican batteries by a mountain path, which, though the only one 
leading to the position, was so broken and rocky as to admit only of 
the passage of troops by the flank. The intention of the brigadier- 
general was, to assault what in the obscurity of the Mexican positions 
appeared to be an angle, connecting batteries Nos. 1 and 2 at once 
upon each flank. The Second Tennessee Regiment, reinforced by a 
company of Kentucky, and one of Pennsylvania, and supported by the 
Second Pennsvlvanians. was to form the assaulting column of the 
American right, while the First Pennsvlvanians, supported by the First 
Tennesseeans, was to attack from the left, nearer the banks of the Rio 
del Plan. For the execution of these operations, the Second Tennessee 
regiment was placed in the advance, and moved to its position ; the 
First Pennsylvanians followed it, with instructions to proceed on to its 
post opposite the Mexican right, and the supporting forces were to have 
been within distance before the assault commenced. But the nature of 
the ground, and the obscurity of the Mexican position, obliged the 
troops to come under fire while in process of formation. The Second 
Tennessee regiment being in advance, was the first to receive it ; and 
although it stood to its ground with heroic bravery, yet the moment 
was critical and dangerous. Seventeen guns from front and flanks were 
opened by the enemy, in full and uninterrupted play ; and as the men 
were falling rapidly, and the fire having commenced at Cerro Gordo, 
Pillow ordered the immediate assault by the troops already in position, 
while in person he hastened to the left of the attacking column. The 
Second Tennessee regiment dashed rapidly forward at battery No. 2, 
through the tangled chaparral, and over rocks and line of abatis, 
which obstructed the approach. But the Mexican fire was heavy, and 
natural difficulties prevented the approach of the supporting force, as 
well as the speedy assault of the Pennsylvanians on the right. Under 
this terrific storm of shot, shell and canister. Pillow, while pushing 
across the ravine to the front of battery No. 1, fell wounded ; and mean- 
while, notwithstanding the noble gallantry of the Second Tennessee 
regiment, the advance from the left had been checked, and under the 
severe fire of the enemy broken in its formation by its movement over 
such difficult ground, with its lieutenant>cok)nel and major, six other 



696 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

commissioned officers, and a fearful number of subordinate rank, upon the 
field, dead or wounded, and under the orders of its colonel (Haskell) to 
retreat, the regiment was falling back in some disorder. The colonel 
set the example, unworthy of his gallant regiment. The movements 
thus delayed, Colonel Campbell, of the First Tennessee Regiment, was 
ordered by Pillow to bring up the supporting forces, and re-form them 
for another and decisive assault. But before the troops could be dis- 
posed, in the confusion resulting from Haskell's retrograde movement, 
the fire which had raged on the American right about the position of 
Cerro Gordo, had ceased ; and the enemy finding his retreat cut ofl^, and 
that Pillow was about to renew the attack, threw out a white flag in 
token of surrender, which was soon after accepted ; and under the escort 
of Pillow's troops, the Mexican opposing forces were marched as pris- 
oners of war to the village of Plan del Rio. 

In this assault the principal loss fell upon the Second Tennessee 
Regiment, and its two companies of reinforcements. The First Tennes- 
seeans, who had fought so nobly at Monterey, although coming into 
action as a supporting force, yet suffered severely ; but their constancy 
and valor were in keeping with their previous conduct, and with that 
devotion with which the soldiers of their heroic state have ever upheld 
her own and their country's honor. 

The check which the Second Tennessee Regiment met with, was ne- 
cessarily a matter of deep regret; but though it lost ground as a body, 
it can never be said that it lost honor ; for the list of killed and 
wounded shows too plainly how constantly the men and subordinate 
officers stood their ground ; and had their colonel acted with a like gal- 
lantry, he, too, would have deserved the warrior's wreath of fame. 
But whether conscious of his own bad conduct or not, he chose some 
time afterwards to lay the responsibility of his own retreat at the door 
of his commander; the same commander who, in his feeling of pride in 
his state, and in charity for the man, had wished that nothing should 
appear against an officer in command of a regiment ofTennesseeans, and 
had included him in the general commendations so well earned by his 
gallant regiment. 

The attack upon General Pillow, in connection with this matter, and 
the effect which it had of bringing to light the bad conduct of him who 
made it, is too recent to have passed from the remembrance of his 
fellow-citizens. The vindication of the general, while it proved that in 
all times he had acted with judgment, and in that manner which under 
all known circumstances was the best calculated to obtain success, 
showed that the person who chose to take so unjustifiable a method of 
attacking a distinguished officer to whom he was politically opposed, as 
to appeal in a production totally uncalled for to the public, while the 
subject of the attack was engaged in service, from which the author of 
the assault had just retired, was totally unfit for the position to which 
the partiality of his soldiers had elected him; and that, in the excite- 
ment of the action, he was not a competent witness, either in regard to 
the conduct of his general, or to any matter which had occurred upon 
the field. 

But the military reputation of General Pillow does not require a re- 
ference to his vindication against this unprovoked and unjustifiable as- 



GIDEON J. PILLOW, OF TENNESSBE. 697 

sault; for the facts of his conduct speak for themselves in his favor, 
and the official reports of his division-commander, and of the general-in- 
chief, alike bear testimony in his praise, while subsequent events have 
placed it far above dispute or contradiction, although party malevo- 
lence and party intrigue have caused most strenuous exertions to be 
put forth to cloud its brilliancy, and to deprive him of the approbation 
of his countrymen— the first wish, as it is the greatest reward, of a true 
patriot and soldier. 

The progress of the Mexican war had shown the necessity of employ- 
ing a larger force of regular troops ; for the term of service of the vol- 
unteers, who had fought so well on every field in whose glories they 
had participated, had nearly expired. 

A bill had passed Congress, authorizing the President to raise ten 
additional regiments for the army, and to appoint the necessary general 
officers for their command. Of his selections for the grade of Major- 
General, Pillow was one, and his future active service in the army was 
in that character. 

When General Scott discharged the twelve months' volunteers, some 
month and a-half before the expiration of their term of service, from 
Jalapa, Pillow was left without command. He had heard of his pro- 
motion, but had not received official notification of it. In the interval 
of active operations, he returned to the United States, and, after a short 
visit to his family, returned to New-Orleans, where for a time he was 
employed in forwarding his command, which had already been raised, 
and of which portions were then en route for the seat of war. He soon 
set out in person, and by the middle of June arrived at Vera Cruz, 
where he found a considerable force encamped, and awaiting the or- 
ganization of transportation to advance. General Cadwallader, one of 
his brigadiers, had arrived from Brazos Santiago, and had marched from 
Vera Cruz a short time previous. In the midst of the sicklv season, 
and in the necessity known to exist of speedy reinforcement to the 
American army, Genera[Pillow at once set about preparing for the 
advance, and by his energetic endeavors, in a few days he was enabled 
to proceed. 

The sultry climate of the iierra caliente of Mexico made the marches 
extremely severe upon officers and men, and, notwithstanding every 
precaution, many suffered under the trial. But moving on asVipidly 
as possible, with a due regard to safety, the column cleared the sickly 
tierra caliente, passed Jalapa, which had been abandoned by the order 
of General Scott, and rising upon the plateau of Mexico, effected a 
junction on the first of July, with Cadwallader, who, under Pillow's 
order, was awaiting its arrival at Perote. Thence the whole command, 
numbering over 2,500 of all arms, marched to Puebla, then the posi- 
tion of the main army, where it arrived on the 8th of July. Through- 
out the movement from Vera Cruz, all the troops had been harrassed 
and annoyed by attacks from guerrilla. The heaviest of these had been 
encountered by the advance under Cadwallader, but they had been con- 
tinued against the other portions, and were kept up from time to time, 
until the column arrived at Puebla. 

While the American army remained at Puebla, it is known that 
negotiations were carried on by General Scott and Mr, Trist with the 



698 BKBTCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

Mexican president, having in view the commencement of negotiations 
for peace. The position held by General Pillow caused him to be 
consulted. The full nature of these negotiations has never been made 
public by the principal participants, General Scott and Mr. Trist. Nay, 
they have positively refused to give information respecting them, and 
that which is known has become apparent more by the development of 
facts in subsequent affairs, than by any declaration, either official or 
private. These facts prove the part which General Pillow took therein, 
and the course which he considered most advantageous to his country, 
as the sequel will fully show. He was in favor of pursuing any law- 
ful method by which the evils of war could be ended, so long as the 
safety and honor of the American army was not placed in jeopardy by a 
reliance upon the good faith of an enemy known to be treacherous in 
the extreme. There is palpable evidence to show that before his march 
from Puebla to the city of Mexico, the general-in-chief had in contem- 
plation the agreement to an armistice, which was afterwards entered 
into ; and Pillow's opposition to this measure, which he feared would 
accumulate the difficulties, if it did not cause disaster to the American 
army, was afterwards the cause of General Scott's displeasure. But 
the facts in relation to the matter will be seen in the course of the 
narrative. 

The American army marched from Puebla in the early part of Au- 
gust, against the Mexican capital. It moved by division on successive 
days. Pillow's, which was the rearmost, moved on the 10th, and on 
the 13th entered the valley of Mexico, making up the total strength of 
the gallant army of 10.500 men, which was about to assault the capital 
of Mexico, a city of 200,000 inhabitants, defended as it was by stony 
fortifications, and an army of over thirty-five thousand men. The pre- 
vious days had been employed in reconnoissance and the selection of a 
point of attack ; and on the 14th a meeting of general officers was held 
at Ayotla, at which the general-in-chief explained his views, and gave 
his orders for an attack upon Mexicalcingo, a strong point on the south- 
east of the city; but these orders were modified on account of in- 
formation, the result of a reconnoissance conducted by Lieutenant- 
Colonel Duncan, by which a route was shown to be practicable, turn- 
ing the system of exterior defences on the east of Mexico, and effecting 
an approach on the southern point. The army moved around Salse 
Chalco, and on the 18th of August was in position near St. Augus- 
tine Flapam, on the Acapulco road. Reconnoissances were made on 
that day for selecting a route for the further advance. Worth's division 
had been advanced to within observing distance of the fortified hacienda 
of San Antonio, which obstructed the direct movement by the Acapul- 
co road. The position was found so strong, that the American general- 
in-chief turned his attention towards a route which he hoped could be 
made practicable by labor; and on the duty of opening the road by the 
rancho of Padienna, across the pedrigal, General Pillow proceeded with 
his division on the morning of the L9th. After advancing a few miles, 
he learned that a strong division of the Mexican army was in position 
to oppose him ; and hearing that the enemy was just then locating his 
heavy guns, he desired to push forward and commence the battle im- 
mediately, and before the enemy had completed his preparations. 



GIDEON" J. PILLOW, OF TBNNESSEK, 699 

General Scott's orders were, however, positive that the road should be 
finished as far as practicable before commencing the action ; and while 
the work was progressing, Twiggs' division was sent forward to the 
advance as the covering force. Upon rising the slope of the hill of 
Zacatepec, the troops came under long range of the Mexican guns, and 
the necessity of a battle, in order to secure a further advance, was at 
once apparent. 

Pillow had been, during the morning, upon the summit of the hill of 
Zacatepec, observing the entrenched camp, which was in his path, and 
had decided upon the plan of operations. The camp lay upon a hill, 
side in front of, and commanding the only practicable route for making 
a road across the pedrigal, an immense field of lava, which extended 
from the mountains on the south of the valley of Mexico to the position 
of San Antonio, and, being deemed impassable by the Mexican general, 
was defended only at the position of the camp. The only direct com- 
munication which the Mexican general, Valencia, had with the capital, 
was by the road through San Angel, running north from the point where 
he had taken post. The Ainerican approach was from the east, and 
Gen. Pillow determined that while an attack should take place in front, 
an endeavor should be made to cross the pedrigal with infantry, and 
seize the village of San Geronimo, which lay directly upon the Mexican 
line of communication, with a view to cutting off reinforcements, and of 
attacking the position in rear. As Twiggs' division had been placed in 
the advance by General Scott, in obedience to Pillow's direction, 
Twiggs moved directly against the front with Smith's brigade, and in a 
few moments. Pillow in person ordered Ililey to move on San Geroni- 
mo. The battle had fairly commenced on the part of the Mexicans, in 
an unceasing cannonade, and Smith's brigade drove back a cloud of 
Mexican skirmishers, which occupied the pedrigal in front of the en- 
trenched camp. His advance was for a time rapid, while Riley's was 
very slow over the difficult ground, and at one time it was feared that 
the passage of the pedrigal was impracticable — but a short time showed 
that this opinion was erroneous, and as in that direction lay the decisive 
point of the field, Pillow at once ordered Cadwallader to follow with his 
brigade, and to support Riley. Soon after Cadwallader had moved, 
Twiggs sent back for support for Smith's brigade, and Pierce, of Pil- 
low's division, was ordered forward ; but as it passed the hill of Zaca- 
tepec, on which the commander had taken position, heavy reinforce- 
ments of Mexican troops were observed in march from the city towards 
the position of Valencia, and the vital importance of the village of San 
Geronimo, which had been unforeseen, was still more fully demonstiated. 
Gen. Pillow, therefore, halted one regiment of Pierce's brigade, which 
he held for some little time, until the intentions of the enemy became 
certain, and then it was sent to the support of Cadwallader and to warn 
him of his danger. The two remaining regiments passed on to the 
front, and all the American troops on the field, except a battery of 
horse-artillery and some squadrons of dragoons, which were unable to 
operate over the rugged ground, had been placed in position, and en- 
gaged the enemy. Some few minutes afterwards, Gen. Scott arrived 
on the field, and although he did not positively assume the command, 
ety, as he was there, and of course consulted upon them, the subsequent 



700 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

movements of the field are substantially his. He expressed his high 
commendation of what Gen. Pillow had ordered, however ; an as all 
the troops were en route or disposed of, he awaited the course of events. 
When Shields' brigade arrived from San Augustin, that general was 
ordered to follow and support the forces which had already passed the 
pedrigal. But the early movements of the action, which Pillow had 
ordered, had already secured the victory — for Valencia was cut off from 
support; Riley had gained a position for attacking his rear; Cadwalla- 
der had taken a strong position in San Geronimo, and offering battle 
with his small brigade to the Mexican army, had arrested its march and 
prevented a junction with Valencia. The isolation of the camp necessa^ 
rily resulted in the achievement of the victory of the following morning. 

It was not until near nightfall that General Pillow obtained General 
Scott's permission to leave the position on the hill of Zacatepec, to cross 
the pedrigal, and give his attention to the immediate movement in the 
vicinity of San Geronimo ; and then the broken and rugged nature of 
the ground rendered a passage impracticable in that direction, as no 
marked elevation was presented which could serve to guide the way 
through the darkness. In consequence, Generals Pillow and Twiggs 
were prevented from crossing; but San Geronimo having been occupied, 
the proper course of action was then fully apparent, and the battle of 
Contreras, which was so gallantly and successfully fought on the follow- 
ing morning, was the consequence. General Pillow arrived on the 
field soon after the achievement of the victory, and pursued the enemy 
to San Angel. From that point he suggested the idea of threatening 
the flanks of San Antonio, by a movement in force, whilst Worth ope- 
rated in front with his division. 

General Scott ordered him to move cautiously forward, and Pillow 
advanced in command of his own and Twiggs' division, and Shields' 
brigade, to Cayacan, where he was overtaken by General Scott, who 
assumed the command. The object thus far had been to force the 
works of San Antonio, and open the road through them to the positions 
of Tacubaya and Chepultepec. But that object had been gained by the 
demonstration and Worth's operations against San Antonio. General 
Bravo had retreated from the position, and Scott, anxious to cut off the 
retreat, pushed Twiggs, with one brigade, towards the San Antonio 
road, to take post between the retreating enemy and the city, and 
ordered Pillow with another to march in the direction of the hacienda, 
and fall on in flank. These movements were ordered without the 
knowledge of the ground, and in no expectation of falling in with the 
main body of the Mexican army, in strong fortified positions. But so 
it was. An advanced regiment of Worth's division, moving on the 
San Antonio road, first came under fire ; and next Twiggs' troops ran 
full against a strongly fortified convent, completely sweeping the path 
by which it had been hoped to cut off the retreat of the enemy. 
The battle of Churubusco was at once commenced, and with such good 
will on the part of the Mexican troops, as to demonstrate, jn the fullest 
manner, that a severe struggle for victory was to be decided before the 
conquest of the capital; or before the agreement of an armistice to 
allow time for negotiations which Gen. Scott had previously determined 
upon, in compliance with the negotiations with the Mexican President. 



GIDEON J. PILLOW, OF TENNESSEE. 701 

When the battle commenced, Pillow was in march towards San 
Antonio in execution of his orders, but the rear of the conflict about 
the convent told him that he was not moving upon the true point of 
battle, and, on coming in sight of the San Antonio causeway, he at 
once inclined strongly to the left, and proceeded rapidly to the head of 
the brigade, across the marshy fields and irrigating ditches which inter- 
vened between him and the road. As he reached it he effected a junc- 
tion with Worth's division, the main body of which was then advancing 
up from San Antonio in pursuit. 

The severity of the battle which was raging on the left, made it ne- 
cessary that decisive action should at once be taken, and the two 
generals prepared to move their commands upon the Mexican posi- 
tions directly in their front, which were in general the line of the rivu- 
let of Churubusco, the passage of which was defended by a strong and 
beautifully constructed tete du pont, mounting several guns of different 
calibres. The main body of the Mexican army was opposed to them ; 
but the nature of the ground, covered as it was with a dense growth 
of corn, prevented close reconnoissance, and here, since the action had 
commenced, and so severely on the left, prudence took the form of 
bold and immediate assault, without which other portions of the army- 
would have been compromised with the whole Mexican force. Though 
without orders from the general-in-chief, the dispositions were made at 
once. Worth stretched his division to the right, and advanced ; Pillow 
sent two regiments to advance on the left of the causeway, and soon 
became closely and warmly engaged. 

To describe so long and so brilliant a military struggle as the battle 
of Churubusco, would take more space than can be given to the pi-e- 
sent memoir. But after it once opened, the bravery and determination 
of the assault was that in which military judgment would alone insure 
success. The Mexicans resisted stoutly, and for nearly three hours 
the loud roar of musketry and the peals of artillery resounded over the 
field, while clouds of smoke hung over the whole Mexican position. 
The American fire in front of the teie du pont was in comparison small, 
for under the direction of their generals, the American troops were 
feeling their way, and would not throw away their fire upon an uncer- 
tain object. 

When the nature of the battle had become developed. General Scott 
sent Shields' and Pierce's brigades to turn the Mexican position, and 
assault the rear of the tete du pont. This force fell in with the strong 
bodies of Mexican reserve, and, although in position of imminent peril, 
made good battle. Neither it nor the troops of Twigg's command, 
however, made any decided impression upon the enemy for a long time. 
To advance was impracticable, although men and officers strove gal- 
lantly to breast the storm of shot which was showered upon them. 
In front of the tete du pont, the struggle was no less terrific ; but the 
American troops were gradually drawing nearer to that work. Worth's 
troops had approached near the river Churubusco, and a party from 
different regiments crossed the rivulet, the Mexicans giving way before 
their determined advance. Pillow, finding it impossible to operate 
with effect against the enemy in their front, under the cross fire of the 
convent, the tete du pont, and the line of the Mexican infantry, moved 



702 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

under this fire im mediately in front of the tete du poni, crossed the 
road, and took post upon the right. Soon after their arrival, the storm 
of the tete du pont took place, and the troops of the united commands, 
rushing through the wet ditches, over the parapets, and into the work, 
carried the first and most important strong point of the Mexican posi- 
tion. Amongst the troops most conspicuous in this successful assault, 
was the 14th regiment of Pillow's division, which, under the leading 
of Colonel Trousdale, a gallant Teunesseean, fell in with and cap- 
tured a portion of the battalion of San Patricio, with its standard. 
This battalion was composed of deserters from the American army ; 
and as the traitors fought with the alternative of a shameful death, 
they were the most desperate of any troops in the ranks of the 
enemy. 

The eflfect of the fall of the tete du pont was to secure the victory to 
the American arms. Before the fiery assault of Pillow's and Worth's 
commands, the Mexican line gave way, and rolled in disorder upon the 
flank of the reserve which was engaged with Shields', which also fled, 
and in a short time the whole Mexican army w^as in full retreat to the 
city ; for, by a happy combination of circumstances, Shields' and 
Pierce's troops pressed heavily upon their opponents, as Pillow and 
Worth drove the enemy from his line, and came down upon the flank. 
The convent opposed to Twiggs still held out, but it was isolated, and 
Col. Duncan having placed his guns in position, to enfilade one face of 
the field-work by which it was surrounded. General Pillow ordered the 
regiment of voltigeurs to move the assault under cover of their fire. 
The Mexican General, Rincon, however, finding himself perfectly un- 
supported, hung out a white flag in token of surrender, and Twigg's 
troops took possession of the place which they had for so long a time 
been contending against. 

The movements in pursuit were commenced by General Pillow or- 
dering Captain Kearney, with three troops of dragoons, to pursue the 
enemy ; and Worth and Pillow, collecting their troops with alacrity, 
moved on, and effecting a junction with Shields' and Pierce's corps, 
which had moved forward to the causeway, were in full march to the 
city, in support of the dragoons, when orders were received from the 
general-in-chief to halt the army, and suspend operations. 

In a few moments, and without material additional loss to the army, 
General Pillow would have entered the city of Mexico, at the head of 
the army ; would most probably have captured Santa Anna, and made 
him and army prisoners, and taken his artillery and munitions of war, 
and put an end to the campaign. To be halted, at such a moment, at 
the head of our victorious army, and to be compelled to call off" the 
pursuit, after two hard-fought battles, in which we had lost, in killed 
and wounded, over one thousand brave men, was a painful duty, and 
one which General Pillow (though with great reluctance) performed, as 
the order of General Scott was positive. 

Upon returning to the battle-field of Churubusco — a distance of a 
mile and half to the rear — General Scott informed General Pillow that 
he had suspended operations for the purpose of granting an armistice to 
treat for peace. 

This, General Pillow immediately opposed, saying to General Scott, 



GIDEON J. PILLOW, OF TENNESSEE. 703 

• 

thai the city was in his power — that he should take it ; put his army 
under shelter; provide for its wants, and then grant the enemy an 
armistice to treat for peace, if he desired it. He further told General 
Scott, that he had no confidence in Santa A.\vc\a.^s good faith, in desiring 
to treat for peace ; and he believed that Santa Anna would avail him- 
self of the interval allowed for an armistice to recruit his beaten army 
and strengthen the defences of the city. 

General Scott replied, that his purpose was settled — that if he enter- 
ed the city, he would disperse the goverment, and with it all hopes of 
peace. 

By the terms of the negotiation at Puebla, General Scott was to pay 
ten thousand dollars in advance. He was to fight a battle before the 
city ; and if he won it, he was then to grant an armistice. He refused 
to take the initiative, by sending a Hag of truce. But he had paid the 
money — had now fought the battle — had halted the army at the moment 
when a last decisive blow was about to be struck, and had now determin- 
ed to grant the armistice. Santa Anna had not sent any flag ; for he had 
refused to take the initiative — neither had he communicated with Gen- 
eral Scott. Santa Amia, in his proclamation declaring the armistice, 
said, that General Scott had asked for it. Hence it is manifest that 
General Scott was acting upon and carrying out the terms, literally, of 
the Puebla negotiation. This conviction having taken possession of 
General Pillow's mind, explains at once his determined and continued 
opposition to the armistice; and when the fears and apprehensions of 
Pillow were all more than verified, and General Scott, after fifteen 
days' fruitless negotiation, found he had again to resume offensive opera- 
tions with numbers greatly reduced, and against the defences greatly 
strengthened — and when it turned out in the after operations of the 
army, in taking the city, that the army had to atone for this error of its 
commanding general, in the blood of over sixteen hundred of its bravest 
spirits, and the armistice had become as odious to the American public 
as it had been fatal to the army, it may at once be seen what motive 
operated upon General Scott, afterwards, in his fierce proscription and 
persecution of the officer who had opposed, with such determined pur- 
pose, his disreputable Puebla negotiations, and the armistice which fol- 
lowed as one of its features. 

By the testimony which was given before the subsequent Court of 
Inquiry, it is proved that both Pillow and Worth opposed the terms 
of that disastrous convention, although in a different manner. Pillow 
opposed it in toto. Worth desired the surrender of the Castle of Che- 
pultepec, as a sine qua non, for the security of the enemy's good faith ; 
and their views were presented to the geueral-in-chief, in an interview 
which took place soon after the conversation. Pillow did not let his 
demonstration of disapprobation of the measure stop here ; but, on the 
same afternoon, wrote a note to the general-in-chief, in which, in the 
most friendly manner, a change of the terms was most strongly urged. 
The note was borne to Gen. Scott by Gen. Pierce, one of the commis- 
sioners. But it failed of effect. Nothing was required as a guarantee 
of Mexican fidelity, though all history told that it was unworthy of 
trust. The armistice was agreed to. Every military advantage, won 
at the cost of the blood of a thousand men at Contreras and Churubus- 



704 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

» 

CO, was given up, and the enemy allowed time to collect his routed 
troops, and to erect formidable inferior fortifications. The conse- 
quence was such as Pillow had anticipated ; and after two weeks of 
negotiation, in which Mr. Trist, the American commissioner, had 
made many unauthorized concessions, in his attempt to conciliate Mex- 
ican pride, the American general-in-chief found himself obliged to 
re-fight the battle, with numbers reduced, and in the face of fortifica- 
tions which had been strengthened and constructed by the enemy du- 
ring the armistice. 

The first effort made by General Scott against the Mexican general, 
after the resumption of hostilities, was the attack on Molino del Key, 
which had for its object the destruction of a foundry supposed to exist. 
With this view it was to be but a partial operation — Worth's division 
and Cad wallader's brigade only to be engaged, while Pillow, with Pierce's 
and Kiley's brigades was to approach the city on its south, to make a 
show of demonstration ; for demonstration it could hardly be called, 
when the point at which they were to be located was more than two 
miles from the city. During the evening of September 7th, General 
Pillow obtained information that the foundry had no existence, and 
communicated it that night to the general-in-chief But Scott had 
made his arrangements, was still in doubt, and the attack took place. 
Worth, however, instead of becoming engaged in a partial skirmish, 
such as had been anticipated, found himself opposed by a large part of 
the Mexican army, and the position of his gallant command was critical 
in the extreme. 

Nothing but hard fighting, and that such as few troops were ever engag- 
ed in, saved the Battle of Molino del Key. During its continuance, Pil- 
low, who, at the hacienda of San Boissa, was watching the progress of 
events, becoming fearful that Worth might not be able to sustain him- 
self against such overwhelming odds, and knowing that he commanded 
the nearest American troops, which even then were three miles from 
the field, started without order, with Pierce's and Riley's brigades, for 
the scene of action. His rapid approach, seen from the Castle of Che- 
pultepec, could have had none other than a dispiriting effect upon the 
enemy, who gave way before the determined valor of Worth's troops, 
just before the reinforcement reached the ground. Pillow's movement 
was approved by General Scott, who had sent an order to that effect 
some time before the battle was decided, which was not received until 
the command was near the village of Tacubaya, on its route. 

General Pillow was not seriously engaged on this day, although his 
troops held the field while Worth's were retiring under General Scott's 
orders; and when the dead and wounded had been removed, Pillow, 
too, was ordered to withdraw, and the battle-field of Molino del Rey, 
so gallantly and so dearly won by the blood of 780 of the flower of the 
army, was given up to the enemy, if he chose to occupy it. The infor- 
mation given to General Scott on the previous evening had been veri- 
fied. The foundry had no existence, and the result, in so far as related 
to advantages gained for the final assault on the Mexican capital, were 
comparatively nothing. 

On the morning of the 9th of September, a strong body of lancers 
having threatened Colonel Riley's position at Nalvaite, General Pillow 



GIDEON J. PILLOW, OF TENNESSEE. ^05 

changed his head-quarters to Piedad in advance of Nalvaite, which 
village he occupied with Pierce's and Riley's brigades, bringing Cadwal- 
lader's forward from Mixcoac to Riley's former position. His pickets 
were thrown forward to the angle of the road of El Nino Perdido, to 
within close observing distance of the enemy, who was found to be 
busily engaged in constructing fortifications along the southern front. 
It was at once perceived that the time for attack at that point was the 
immediate moment, and information was sent to General Scott of the 
state of affairs, and the unfinished condition of the fortifications ; but 
the general-in-chief did not contemplate an immediate assault, and gave 
strict order that no advance should be made from Piedad, although 
General Pillow was ordered to maintain his ground in case he was at- 
tacked ; and, in order to do so, was authorized to call up Twiggs' and 
Quitman's corps from San Angel and Cayacan. The Mexicans, how- 
ever, made no attack; and throughout the 9th, 10th and 11th of Sep- 
tember, continued at work on their fortifications, which, on the morning 
of the 11th, were nearly completed. On that day the general-in-chief 
came to Piedad, and, at the meeting of general officers, decided upon 
his plan of action, which was to assault, by the western front, the Castle 
of Chepultepec, being the first great point to be seized. Twiggs' divi- 
sion being left to make a demonstration on the lines of the south front, 
on the night of the 11th, Generals Pillow and Quitman marched their 
divisions silently into Tacubaya, and took position, preparatory to seiz- 
ing covering points of the batteries about to be erected against the 
castle. Quitman was to take post on the south of Chepultepec, and 
Pillow on the west, on the plains and in Molino del Rey. 

General Pillow moved out to the plains while yet dark, and at the 
first dawn of light sent a picked corps down to Molino del Rey, which 
the enemy had no time to occupy. Having seized these points, his 
duty was that of covering the batteries, and throughout the twelfth his 
troops remained in observation of Chepultepec, and a cloud of Mexican' 
cavalry which had taken post on his left flank. 

The effect of the batteries not being sufficiently great to cause the 
fall of the castle, it became evident that it must be stormed, and on the 
night of the 12th the orders for the assault were issued. 

On the morning of the 13th September, the American batteries re- 
opened heavily upon the castle — the Mexicans as promptly replied, 
and both parties were busily engaged in preparing for the struggle. 
Quitman's approach lay along the Tacubaya road, and over strong bat- 
teries at the base of the rock over which the castle is situated, over an 
exterior wall, and up the declivity to the work. Pillow's through Mo- 
lino del Rey, across an open field, over a line of ditches and entrench- 
ments, through the cypress grove to the base of the rock, over a redan 
half way up the declivity, which being passed, the troops would be in 
close vicinity to the object of attack, the castle of Chepultepec. The 
arrangements for this attack, which were made by General Pillow, 
were to attack the lines of entrenchments with one battalion of volti- 
geurs, while another proceeded outside the walls of the inclosure, which 
surrounded the rock and fields of the position, against an adobe bastion 
covering a cut in the wall, which being gained, the assaulting troops 
were in the rear of the line of entrenchments. If the line of entrench- 

45 



706 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

ments was first carried, then the bastion would be taken in reverse by 
the troops which had been successful in that quarter. The first of these 
battalions was to be supported by the Ninth and Fifteenth regiments ; 
the second, by a storming party of veteran troops from Worth's division, 
by which Pillow had been reinforced. After the troops had entered 
the woods, it was intended they should be beat through to the base of 
the rock, the voltigeurs being in advance to that point. There they 
were to halt and re-form, while the stormers passed to the front, and, 
with the support of the three regiments, to ascend and storm the castle. 
To prevent the introduction of reinforcements by the road north of 
Chepultepec, as well as to watch the strong corps of Mexican cavalry 
on the left, Colonel Trousdale was stationed with the Eleventh and 
Fourteenth regiments at the angle of the Molino del Rey. 

Soon after 8 o'clock, the American batteries ceased their fire, and 
the assault commenced. Having ordered forward the party which was 
to advance outside the wall. Pillow proceeded through Molino del Rey, 
and sent the other through the gate into the field and against the en- 
trenchments. The enemy had got the range of the gate from Chepul- 
tepec, and kept up a heavy fire of shot and shell upon it ; but while the 
voltigeurs were pushing across the open field, the general stood watch- 
ing their progress until they reached the line of entrenchments, when 
he quickly ordered forward the ninth and fifteenth regiments. As, with 
a shout of enthusiasm, these corps rushed through the narrow way. Pil- 
low mounted, and, with his staft', passing rapidly to the front, toolc the 
advance. The Mexican troops fought well in the woods, and the guns 
of the castle sent showers of grape and canister upon the assailants. 
Knowing the vital importance of success, and the necessity of the crisis, 
still in advance, the general of the division pressed on, his gallant troops 
followed and beat back the enemy to the base of the hill. Just before 
reaching it. Pillow fell severely and painfully wounded. But seeing 
the necessity for immediate attack, although the stormers, delayed by 
the difficulties of the ground, and not having been able in their close 
formation to keep pace with the light troops, had not yet taken the 
advance, he ordered the immediate assault ; for the enemy were rally- 
ing in the redan, and commencing a heavy fire. The troops in position 
promptly and quickly obeyed, and the redan was carried. Tiie volti- 
geurs, ninth and fifteenth crowned the hill, and taking post in the rocks, 
commenced making a rapid discharge of rifles and muskets against the 
defenders of the castle. The fall of Chepultepec was secured in this 
manner, for when the stormers and the ladders were brought forward, 
the enemy's fire had nearly ceased. Other troops had advanced in sup- 
port, taking post behind Pillow, but when the ladders were planted the 
troops of his division entered the work in advance, and pushing to the 
eastern division, secured not only its possession but the fall of tiie bat- 
teries on the Tacubaya road — for the Mexicans there held out until a 
party of voltigeurs and of the 15th regiment poured a volley into their 
rear ; then they broke, and the American troops opposed to them en- 
tered the batteries, and the whole position was carried ; for, with the 
castle, fell not only the batteries on the south, but the barricades on the 
north, against which Colonel Trousdale's command had been bravely 
advancing. 



GIDEON J. PILLOW, OF TENNESSEE. 707 

The effect of this important capture was to secure the fall of the capi- 
tal of Mexico, and to raise the spirits of the American troops to the 
highest state of enthusiasm. All felt that final success was certain, and 
as the commander, whose troops had been foremost in achieving the 
brilliant victory, was borne wounded into the works shortly after their 
occupation, the loud acclaiming shouts of the soldiers bore testimony 
to their appreciation of his conduct. 

For some three months after this achievement, General Pillow was 
confined to his quarters from the effect of his wound, and, meanwhile, 
various circumstances brought about a rupture, as annoying to all con- 
cerned as it was unfortunate for the American general-in-chief. The 
battles had been fought ; the great military operations of the army were 
finished, and the fame which would attach to the achievement, in the 
way of making political capital, and in promoting the claims of the 
general-in-chief to be the candidate of the whig party for the presi- 
dency, became at once the object of his serious attention. The worst 
feature of which, to be seen in the whole course of his operations, is the 
agreement to the convention of Tacubaya, by which every military ad- 
vantage was sacrificed to an uncertain political end. Generals Worth 
and Pillow had opposed this convention as it was agreed to, and it is 
somewhat remarkable that the general-in-chief took the first opportu- 
nity to quarrel with and arrest the two highest in rank in his army next 
to himself. 

His exhibition of ill-humor against Pillow was demonstrated in rela- 
tion to two small guns, of which the latter knew absolutely nothing; 
but the remarks of the general-in-chief, made in his absence before a 
number of general and other officers, were so pointed and offensive, 
that Pillow felt constrained to call a court of inquiry. The court com- 
mitted an error of fact in its finding, and its opinion based on this error 
was therefore, in some respects, erroneous. Pillow called the attention 
of Scott to the error, and requested that the case should be referred 
back to the court for re-consideration, but Scott refused, and on this re- 
fusal Pillow appealed to his government. His appeal, and the matter 
contained therein, was the ostensible ground of his arrest ; but the na- 
ture of the charges subsequently proved that it was but the pretext to 
cover his real motives. 

There had been received from the United States two published let- 
ters from the army in Mexico, in which Generals Pillow and Worth 
were spoken of in terms of high commendation. The knowledge that 
those letters had gone forth, so incensed General Scott, that he caused 
the issue of General Order, No. 349, in which these two officers were 
accused with puffing themselves, although at the time the general-in- 
chief had confessedly no proof upon w^hich to base his unheard-of ap- 
peal to the lower ranks of the army to cast their contumely upon two 
generals whose lead the greater portion of the troops had often followed 
to victory. The issue of this order, by the manifestation of jealousy 
which was displayed, went far to show the fear lest these same two 
officers should receive more credit than he in his arrogant pruriency of 
fame was disposed to allow, and in it may also be seen the conscious- 
ness that they were entitled to it. If not, why did he thrust forth an 



708 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS, 

order so injurious to discipline, and endeavour to falsify facts ■which 
were too well known to permit of undue credit being received by anyl 

These facts were brought out in the investigation before the court of 
inquiry, but as yet a veil of mystery has concealed from the public why 
it was that General Pillow's opposition to the armistice should have 
brought about so bitter a controversy with General Scott, and so deeply 
involving his reputation. It was expected, during the progress of the 
investigation, that this mystery would have been explained ; but Gen. 
Pillow, in his defence, confined the proof to the points at issue in the 
charges against him, leaving unexplained the secret motives of his accu- 
sers. 

As, however, the necessity of that silence has ceased to exist, and as 
the disclosure is necessary to the truth of history, and to a proper ap- 
preciation of the self sacrificing devotion with which he endured the ob- 
loquy heaped upon him, and the firmness with which he stood by the 
safety of the army (which he, in fact, commanded) and the honor of the 
country ; while, at the same time, this disclosure will do honor to the 
memory of a great statesman who then directed the affairs of the na- 
tion, it now becomes proper that the veil of mystery should be with- 
drawn, and the facts become matter for history. 

In 1847 President Polk appointed N. P. Trist a commissioner to ac- 
company the army, with authority to treat for peace should an oppor- 
tunity present itself On Mr. Trist's departure for Mexico, the President 
forwarded to Gen. Pillow a commission as major-general in the army, 
and with it a private and confidential letter, informing him of Mr. 
Trist's appointment, of his instructions, and of his (Mr. Polk's) directions 
to Mr. Trist to lay his instructions before him, (General Pillow,) — to 
consult him fully and freely ; and added, that he should feel better satis- 
fied to know that the honor of his administration and the interest of the 
country were guarded by his judgment and prudence, and that he (Mr. 
Polk) relied upon his (Pillow's) friendship to see that neither was com- 
promised. 

This letter placed General Pillow in secret semi-official relations with 
Mr. Trist. It is also evident from it that Mr. Polk did not have full 
confidence in Mr. Trist. To have been thus placed in a position, in 
which he had, in a great degree, the responsibility of the negotiation, 
without the power to control the result, was a most embarrassing situ- 
ation, while the confidential manner in which the duty was imposed 
greatly increased the difficulty. 

This statement of facts is necessary to a proper understanding of what 
took place afterwards. The letter referred to is still in existence, and 
in possession of Gen. Pillow. 

In a few days after Gen. Pillow arrived in Puebla, (in the latter part 
of July, 1847,) where he first met with Mr. Trist, and received this let- 
ter of President Polk. He was sent for by Mr. Trist, and requested to 
visit his quarters. Upon his arrival he found Gen. Scott and Mr. Trist, 
and was told by Mr. Trist, that, in compliance with the instructions of 
the President, he invited him to a conference with himself and General 
Scott, who then had under consultation the reply of Santa Anna, through 
Mr. Mcintosh, the British consul, to a communication of his, (Mr. 



GIDEON J. PILLOW, OF TENNESSEE. 709 

Trist's,) informing Santa Anna that he was with the army, with authority 
to treat for peace. 

General Scott, assuming the lead in the conversation, said, that Santa 
Anna said he could do nothing without money ; that he must have 
$10,000 paid in advance, and one million more when the treaty should 
be agreed upon. He further said that Mr. Trist did not have the mo- 
ney, but that he could pay the $10,000 out of the secret service fund 
in his hands, and that he could raise the balance, and that they both de- 
sired to know what he thought best to be done under all the circum- 
stances. 

Gen. Pillow asked Mr. Trist if there was any law authorizing such 
an expenditure, or if he had the authority of the President to make such 
use of the public money ] To which he replied in the negative. General 
Pillow then said he thought it was wrong in itself to purchase a peace 
by bribing the commanding general of the enemy's forces ; that it would 
be disgraceful to the army and the government, and that he was op- 
posed to it. 

General Scott promptly remarked — " Perhaps, General Pillow, you 
have not reflected upon the subject ?" He said it was not wrong in it- 
self; because the fact that Santa Anna was found in the market offer- 
ing to receive a bribe, was evidence that he was already corrupted ; 
that it was not disreputable to the army or to the government, for it was 
a means resorted to by all governments to effect their purposes, and 
that it was a usage recognized by our own government, and mentioned 
several instances in which it had used money to effect its purposes. 
Among others, he instanced the Maine boundary question, in which, he 
said, the government had expended 8500,000 to silence the Maine press ; 
also the practice of our government in making presents to the Barbary 
powers and the chiefs of Indian tribes (which were nothing but bribes) 
as the means of procuring treaties with them. He further said the great 
want of our government and people was peace; that if the army 
marched to Mexico and took the city, we should disperse the govern- 
ment, and with it all hopes of peace, and that the war might be pro- 
tracted indefinitely, and that it might cost the government one hundred 
millions of dollars and the lives of many brave men. Gen. Pillow, 
having great respect for the opinions of Gen. Scott, and not doubting 
the correctness of the facts stated by Gen. Scott as to the usage of the 
government, then asked him, how he could settle so large a sum with 
the accounting offices at Washington ? How could he get a legal 
voucher for such an item as he proposed to pay ? Gen. Scott promptly 
replied, that he would have the money paid over to Mr. Trist, and take 
his receipt, and have the amount charged to the contingent expenses of 
the war. Gen. Pillow supposed a committee of Congress should be ap- 
pointed to investigate the accounts, and asked him how would he then 
manage it ? Gen. Scott said, the committee would report upon the pro- 
priety of the expenditure, and not the item itself. By these views, 
which were entirely new to Gen. Pillow, he was led to doubt the cor- 
rectness of the opinions first expressed, and said, that perhaps it was his 
duty not to stand in the way, and that he should therefore waive his ob- 
jections. The conference here broke up. On the second day afterwards, 



710 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

Capt. Williams, an officer of Gen. Scott's staff, visited General Pillow's 
quarters, and told him that General Scott desired him to visit his quar- 
ters that night at eight o'clock. 

At the appointed hour, General Pillow went to General Scott's quar- 
ters, where he found General Scott and a number of his general officers 
seated around his table in the centre of the room. When the other 
general officers invited to the meeting had arrived. General Scott said, 
he had summoned them to consult them about a matter involving the 
question of peace or a continuance of the war. 

Without any reference to the private conference which they had had 
two days before at Mr. Trist's quarters, General Scott went substan- 
tially over the same ground he had done at the private conference ; 
made the same arguments, apparently in anticipation of the very objec- 
tions which General Pillow had made, and met them by the same views 
and statements, as to the usage of nations and of our own government, 
which he had done at the private conference, and concluded by saying, 
that he wanted their opinions — wanted the advice of the officers present 
as to what was best to be done. He then said to General Pillow, be- 
ing the ranking officer present, " Let us have your opinion first." Pillow 
replied, that he supposed it was choosing the least of evils to agree to 
Santa Anna's terms. He then called for General Quitman's opinion, 
who replied that he was opposed to it ; for Gen. Twiggs', who said he 
thought it was a political question, and that he was no politician ; for 
Gen. Shields', who expressed himself strongly opposed to it ; and for 
General Cadwallader's, who laughed, and said he thought the question 
was decided. 

Generals Worth, Pierce, and Smith, were not present. Gen. Scott 
then said, he was satisfied that he was right in acceding to Santa Anna's 
terms ; that he had paid the 810,000, and would pay the balance when 
peace was made, and that he would take the whole responsibility upon 
himself. He further said, that the meeting was a confidential one upon 
official business and he deemed it unnessessary to say it would be so 
considered by those present. The meeting was then dismissed. 

Having been much surprised that the facts of the negotiation (hereto- 
fore deemed strictly confidential between the parties to the private con- 
ference) were thus placed before the meeting of general officers, and 
would thus go before the public, and never having been satisfied with 
the correctness of the conclusion to which he had come at the private 
conference, Gen. Pillow went that night to Mr. Trist's quarters, but 
found his door closed, so that he could not see him. He went again 
next morning, and found Mr. Trist in bed; told him everything General 
Scott had done the night before at the meeting of general officers ; said 
to Mr. Trist that he knew he (Pillow) had been originally opposed to the 
whole matter ; that he had never been satisfied with the conclusions to 
which he had come in agreeing to waive his objections ; that he had 
erred in so doing, and that he had come to him for the purpose of put- 
ting himself right ; that he then protested against the whole matter, and 
would avail himself of the first opportunity of informing the President 
of the whole transaction. 

Mr. Trist thereupon said, he himself had never been entirely satis- 



OF TENNESSEE. 711 

fied, and that he then believed that he (Gen. Pillow) was right, but that 
General Scott had actually paid the ten thousand dollars, and was co??i- 
mitted. General Pillow then asked Mr. Trist if there was no point of 
disagreement between Santa Anna and Gen. Scott. After a moment's 
reflection, he said yes ; that Santa Anna required that, after fighting a 
battle. General Scott should send a flag of truce, and grant an armistice 
to treat for peace, but that Gen. Scott thought, that if he fought the 
battle and won it, that Santa Anna should take the initiative, and send 
the flag ; but that as Gen. Scott had sent the ten thousand dollars, he 
supposed he had waived that point. Gen. Pillow replied, that that point 
being open, he would see Gen. Scott, and try to get him to break off the 
agreement, and put an end to the negotiation. Accordingly, he went 
directly to General Scott's quarters, saw him, had a long and animated 
conversation with him, protesting against the whole matter, and urged 
General Scott to relieve himself from his committal. 

Gen. Scott at length said, that Gen. Pillow was right, thanked him 
for the manly manner in which he had expressed himself, and told him 
to return to his quarters that night, and that he would show him the 
letter he would write to relieve himself. Gen. Pillow did return, as di- 
rected — saw the letter — thought it altogether equivocal in its meaning, 
but was satisfied with it, conceiving it to be well calculated to relieve 
him from a false position. 

After the army had marched from Puebla, Mr. Trist and Gen. Scott 
became remarkably intimate and friendly. They moved, messed and 
lived together. General Pillow was never afterwards admitted to any 
private conference. He was never again consulted by either of them 
during the negotiations which followed the armistice, and that they both 
determined upon a rupture with him, and upon his disgrace and the de- 
struction of his character, in consequence of his opposition to the secret 
negotiation at Puebla, and to the armistice, and the belief that he had 
or would communicate this information to the President, and that this 
was the secret motive which actuated both, is proven beyond all doubt, 
by the facts elicited in that investigation, and the secret relation which 
is shown to have existed between Gen. Pillow and Mr. Trist. 

In the mean time the President had recalled Mr. Trist, and as he be- 
lieved under Pillow's information of the Puebla negotiation. An ad- 
ditional motive actuating both, is to be seen in the fact, that they both 
were exasperated against Mr. Polk ; Gen. Scott, for the severe rebuke 
he had received from the President, for his insubordination, as shown in 
" the hasty plate of soup" letter — ^Mr. Trist, for his recall. They both 
knew the confidential relations which existed between the President and 
General Pillow — and that the President would keenly feel the disgrace 
of his confidential and bosom friend ; and they intended that the stab 
should reach the heart both of the President and their intended victmi. 

It is thus made manifest that what appeared to the public to be 
a personal difficulty and private quarrel between Generals Scott and 
Pillow, was in fact, a controversy relating exclusively to public matters 
of deep and vital interest to the honor of the country and well-being 
of the army, and that all the obloquy so long borne by Pillow in si- 
lence was in fact for the firm and fearless discharge of public duty 
imposed upon him by the President. 



712 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

I g 

A conspiracy to destroy an innocent man, more powerful in the means \ 

used, and more corrupt in the secret malice of those actuated, is without 
a parallel in this age or country. 

The charges which were preferred against General Pillow were volu- 
minous, and of the most scandalous character. Not only was he charged 
with various misdemeanors, but in regard to his military conduct, Gen. 
Scott endeavored to falsify his own official approbations, which had been 
given with a full knowledge of the facts, and which, when he made 
them, he strove to represent as having been elicited by the gallantry of 
his lieutenant, under his own observation. Amongst other allegations. 
Pillow was charged with having been in favor of the armistice, before it 
was entered into, and the whole tenor of the document against him was 
of so argumentative a nature, that, in the words of Mr. Trist, (in rela- 
tion to one of General Scott's letters,) whose bitter malignity against 
Pillow, since the failure of his mad scheme of negotiations, proved how 
much he had to do with fomenting the discord, it was more fitted " to 
adorn the columns of some reckless partisan press," than to have place 
among the military archives of the country. In a word, it bore ample 
internal evidence that it was never intended for trial ; but in the hope 
that it would be thrust aside at Washington, Gen. Scott intended that 
it should remain unanswered by his victim, who must sink under the 
weight of the charges, and of the character of the accuser; a belief fully 
verified by the attempt which the general-in-chief made to shrink from 
the position of prosecutor, until Pillow, conscious of his innocence, 
called upon the court to compel him to prosecute, and to sustain, if he 
could, the truth of his calumnious allegations. 

The proceedings of that famous court are too fresh in the memory of 
the American people to require much comment. But every charge was 
met and disproved ; and when the court closed its sittings, the fame of 
Gen. Pillow was clear of reproach. Even the vile slanders of the party 
presses were silenced, and the facts of the case brought out by the 
sworn testimony of witnesses of all ranks, were high in his favor. The 
charges at once fell to the ground ; and as the war closed. Gen. Pillow 
retired from the service to private life. 

" Gen. Pillow is now in the prime of manhood, being less than fifty 
years of age. He is descended from as gallant an ancestry as ever con- 
tributed, by their "energy and enterprise, to subdue the obstacles incident 
to pioneer life, and by their valor and patriotism to chastise the savage 
tribes for their m-erciless butcheries of our border settlers. From an 
ancestry famous in the early history of our state for their bold and 
daring intrepidity in defending our weak and scattered settlements, and 
in avenging their wrongs with promptitude and success, Gen. Pillow 
has inherited some of these characteristics which have marked his whole 
history. Until he entered upon his duties as a brigadier-general in the (I 

late war, he had never sought or filled any public civil station. He was lit- 
erally taken from the walks of private life, and transferred to a highly ,. 
honorable military position. But it must be borne in mind that he % 
received his commission from a president who knew him personally, 

and was intimately acquainted with his peculiar traits of charactei. ',. 

These peculiar traits pointed him out to the President as possessing •li 

high qualifications as a military commander. J 



GIDEON J. PILLOW, OF TENNESSEE. 713 

" loathe prosecution of his private pursuits, General Pillow had dis- 
played a quickness of conception, a promptness of execution, an energy 
in action, and a success in results, which are observed in the business 
transactions of few men. His mind operated with uncommon rapidity, 
and he reached his conclusions almost at a glance, and in the next mo- 
ment he was ready for action. No matter how important or compli- 
cated the transaction or enterprise, he saw it in all its bearings at one 
view, and, as if by intuition, made up his mind as to his course, and 
then suffered no obstacle to check his energy, and no doubt ever to 
cloud his success. He combined, in an unusual manner, the capacity 
to devise with that to execute. Hence he was eminently successful as 
a practitioner of law, and not less so in the various important enter- 
prises connected with his private affairs. In all these, his character 
for promptness, industry, energy, and perseverance, was fully estab- 
lished. 

" General Pillow had enjoyed the advantages of a liberal education, 
and therefore entered upon his career with a well-trained and cultivated 
mind. His intellect was naturally of a very high order, and its cul- 
ture had well fitted him for attaining to distinction in any one of the 
learned professions. From the time that he first appeared at the 
bar with his license, he entered upon a most extensive and laborious 
business. As a speaker, he soon took a prominent position in his pro- 
fession. He reasoned with clearness and force, whilst his knowledge of 
human nature taught him how to appeal to the passions, and his powers 
of declamation enabled him to combine in his oratory every available 
species of appeal in the management of his causes. There were others 
more profoundly learned in the law as a science, but there were 
none who adhered more closely to the interests of their clients, or who 
would bring more resources into play in the management of their 
cases. 

" From this brief view of the peculiar traits in the character of Gen. 
Pillow, we can readily understand why Mr. Polk conferred upon him 
a high military command. The President appointed him upon his own 
knowledge of his qualifications ; and though others were incredulous 
because they were unacquainted with the real character of General Pil- 
low, Mr. Polk never doubted that the appointment would turn out to 
be highly satisfactory to the country." 

It is said in the foregoing sketch that General Pillow had never 
sought or filled any civil station in public life previous to his ap- 
pointment as brigadior-general by President Polk. This is true ; 
but it is also true that for many years he had been repeatedly 
urged by his democratic friends to accept political honors at their 
hands. These solicitations were uniformly declined by him, and 
yet no member of the democratic party was more ardent in 
his devotion to its doctrines and its success, and none was more 
prompt and enthusiastic in sustaining its candidates. He was an en- 
thusiastic admirer of 'General Jackson, and gave to his administration 
a zealous and uniform support. Being a neighbor of James K. Polk, 
and a warm political as well as personal friend, their associations were 
intimate, and their agreement on political questions cordial. As a 



714 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

member of the Baltimore Convention in 1844, he exerted a decided in- 
fluence in bringing its deliberations to a harmonious close. 

In the canvass which followed, General Pillow took an active and 
efficient part. He was a confidential adviser of Mr. Polk, as well as an 
able and eloquent advocate of* his election. Since the close of the 
Mexican war. General Pillow's name has been earnestly brought forward 
for Ckjngress, and for Governor of Tennessee; but he has promptly de- 
clined the honors thus tendered to him, preferring the harmony and 
success of the democratic party to his own personal promotion. 

In the all-absorbing question which has divided the North and South 
for the last few years, General Pillow has taken a deep interest. His 
feelings and sympathies have been, and still are, strongly with the South ; 
he has looked upon political abolitionism and free-soilism as an unjustifi- 
able and dangerous interference with the constitutional rights of southern 
men. In disposing of the question of slavery as connected with our 
acquisition of territory from Mexico, he believed that the extension of 
the Missouri compromise line to the Pacific would contribute the most 
equitable and satisfactory adjustment. The preservation of the National 
Union, however, upon its original terms, and with its constitutional 
guarantees, was at all times a paramount object with him, and hence he 
uniformly condemned every proposition which looked to disunion as a 
remedy for the evils of the South. The sacred right of revolution he 
was willing to resort to only in the last extremity, and when the oppres- 
sions of a dominant majority should become intolerable. Whilst he 
has not regarded the compromise measures as doing justice to the 
South, he has looked upon them as the result of a compact in which the 
South as well as the North was bound in honor to acquiesce, and hence 
he has maintained that both parties to the covenant should be held to the 
high obligations growing out of the adjustment. In this light, he has 
cheerfully acquiesced in the compromise, as a final settlement of the 
slavery issue, and stands earnestly opposed to its disturbance either 
at the North or the South. These were the views expressed by General 
Pillow in the Southern Convention, in which he dissented from the 
action of a majority of that body. 

It is impossible to fully comprehend and appreciate the true character 
of General Pillow, without examining the peculiar obstacles which he 
had to encounter and overcome. His appointment as a brigadier- 
general was seized upon by the whig press throughout the country 
as the basis of a most violent and unsparing assault upon the Presi- 
dent. This was followed up with faithful severity by the whole brood 
of little politicians, who caught up and repeated, with untiring industry, 
the malignant calumnies and aspersions originating with unprincipled 
partisans for mere party purposes. He was assailed with abuse, de- 
nunciation and ridicule, to such an extent, that, long before he had met 
the enemy, the public judgment seemed to be made up against him. 
Few men could have bore up under the crushing weight of this com- 
bined partisan warfare. It was continued with unmitigated ferocity 
whilst General Pillow was performing deeds of heroic daring on hard- 
fought battle-fields, which would have done honor to the most distin- 
guished captains of this or any other age. No matter how bravely or 



J 



GIDBON J. PILLOW", OF TENNESSEE. 715 

skilfully he led his command — no matter with how much daring he 
charged the impregnable breastworks of the enemy — no matter if his 
plans were skilfully conceived and successfully executed — no matter if 
he bared his bosom in the thickest of the fight, and poured out his 
blood again and again — yet the insatiate harpies of party abated noth- 
ing of the violence and malignity of their assaults. As he pushed for- 
ward with unceasing energy towards the capital of Mexico, and aided 
in winning victory after victory, his enemies at home redoubled their 
exertions, and sought to overwhelm his name with a cloud of odium 
and obloquy which could never be dispelled by his achievements, no 
matter with what splendor they might shine. His reputation seemed 
at one time to be effectually damned, even beyond the reach of defence 
by his political friends. This was especially the case when General 
Scott joined the conspiracy, and undertook to strangle his victim by 
bringing to bear upon him the full weight of his exalted name "and sta- 
tion. Abused, slandered, ridiculed and vilified at home by the united 
strength of the whig party, General Scott undertook to complete the 
work of defamation and destruction by a conspiracy in Mexico as foul 
as that which existed at home. How he was ever to escape irretriev- 
able ruin, under such circumstances, his best friends could not see. Yet, 
amidst the thickest gloom which hung over him. General Pillow en- 
treated his friends not to doubt, much less to despair, of his final 
triumph. He announced to them that he was the victim of a most 
malignant conspiracy, but that when the facts were developed his vindi- 
cation would be complete, and that his countrymen would do him justice. 
The blow which was aimed by General Scott, and which was intended 
to be the finishing stroke, was seized upon by General Pillow as the 
means of securing his triumphant vindication. Most men would have 
sunk under the power which General Scott brought to bear upon 
his victim ; but General Pillow met the assault with fearlessness and 
confidence, and resolved not only to vindicate himself but to overwhelm 
his enemies with disgrace. The result of that celebrated trial is fresh 
in the recollection of every American citizen. It has forever silenced 
and put to shame his malignant revilers, whilst it has covered his ene- 
mies who had conspired against him with damning disgrace. It has 
brought prominently before the country the extent and value of his 
military services; and, in that way, the public mind has been disabused, 
and the public judgment has been made up. General Pillow managed 
and directed his own vindication ; and we fearlessly assert, that none 
but a man of the most exalted talents, and of the most remarkable traits 
of character, could have successfully grappled with such overwhelming 
odds, and made his prosecutors bite the very dust in which they sought 
to prostrate him. 

Whoever looks carefully into the details of the military operations 
which won the splendid victories of'Contreras, Churubusco, and Che- 
pultepec, will find unmistakable evidences of military sagacity in the 
suggestions and plans of Gen. Pillow, which contributed in an eminent 
degree to the achievement of the brilliant results ; he will also find that 
these results might have been reached with a much less sacrifice of pre- 
cious blood, if General Scott had followed the counsels and suggestions 
of General Pillow more closely. This remark is especially applicable 



716 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

to the disastrous blunder committed by General Scott in not following 
up his advantages after the victory of Churubusco, and in disregarding 
the counsels of Pillov^^ and Worth, and agreeing to an armistice. 
Against the earnest and repeated advice of General Pillow the armistice 
was agreed upon ; and every advantage won at the cost of the lives of 
a thousand brave men at Contreras and Churubusco, was given up, and 
the enemy allowed time to collect his routed forces and to erect formi- 
dable fortifications. After two weeks of fruitless negotiations, the 
error became palpable when General Scott found himself compelled to 
re-fight the battle, with numbers reduced, and in the face of fortifications 
which had been strengthened and constructed during the armistice. 

The victory of Chepultepec secured the fall of the Mexican capital, 
and crowned the campaign with a halo of glory which will shine with 
undiminished brightness in all time to come. General Pillow's 
chivalrous conduct in that splendid achievement won for him the title 
of the Hero of Chepultepec — the justice of which title was fully ac- 
knowledged by the loud acclaiming shouts of the soldiers, as their com- 
mander was borne wounded into the work, soon after its occupation 
by his brave troops. 

In this brief sketch it has not been our purpose to do more than barely 
allude to the various occasions in which General Pillow signalized him- 
self as a military commander. Full justice to the subject is the more 
immediate province of the historian. The incidents of the brilliant 
march of our gallant army from Vera Cruz to the city of Mexico, and 
the prominent part borne by him in the several splendid achievements 
of that march, are too fresh in the minds of an admiring country to re- 
quire any reference to them in detail. We may remark, however, that 
as a military commander he exhibited the same prominent traits of 
character which we have referred to as having marked his private career. 
Fearless of danger, his conduct on some occasions bordered on rashness 
— but it was rashness in exposing his own person in leading in the situ- 
ation where officers of his grade seldom lead. Notwithstanding the 
extraordinary efforts which were made to depreciate his services, the 
judgment of all impartial military men has pronounced his approval, 
and assigned to him a position alongside of the most skilful and success- 
ful heroes of the nation. 




-.r:.'.--"' 






^Z^jj-Ci'-Z, Ji'iiJ^ t?/ 7j£*'J'^.>" /-^^ .'?'.r.^-tr. 



-vi--,^. -r .-/" ,'.//: v.-., ^ 



SAMUEL PRENTISS, OF VERMONT. 717 



HON. SAMUEL PRENTISS, 

DISTRICT JUDGE OF THE UNITED STATES FOR VERMONT. 

Greatness in character rarely strikes one at the first sight. It takes 
time to perceive it, and it requires time also to unfold and to stamp it. 
Truth is the residuum of time. It is not always those who stand most 
prominently in the present, that will appear most eminent to a future 
generation. It often happens, on the other hand, that the quiet, unos- 
tentatious, and almost unnoticed man among his co temporaries, will 
seem, when surveyed from some stand-point in the future, to be of 
fair and excellent proportions. And the name that is little thought of 
by us, may be most regarded by those whom present interests, passions, 
friendships, and animosities, affect not at all. The subject of this notice, 
though he may not have occupied that share of public attention which 
has often been given to men of less merit and virtue, may yet live 
in history, and be remembered as one among the few names in 
the records of a state, which was chiefly honored in having them for her 
sons. 

Samuel Prentiss was born in Stoniugton, Connecticut, March 31, 
1782. He was the son of Dr. Samuel and Mrs. Lucretia H. Prentiss. 
His grandfather was Colonel Samuel Prentiss, of Stonington. In 1783, 
his father removed to Worcester, Massachusetts, and from thence, in 
1786, to Northfield, in the same state. There, after having attained 
considerable eminence as a physician and surgeon, he died in 1818. 

From an early age, Mr. Prentiss was a pupil in the common schools, 
and the entire course of his pupilage was one of diligence and success. 
When he left the schools, he was placed under the private instruction 
of the Rev. Samuel C. Allen, the minister of Northfield. Under his 
tuition, he pursued the usual course of classical studies, then taught in 
our higher literary institutions. After he had finished his youthful and 
preparatory studies, he entered the office of Solomon Yose, Esq., of 
Northfield, Massachusetts, as a law student. He completed his course 
of law reading in the office of John W. Blake, Esq., in Brattleboro', 
Vermont. In December, 1802, he was admitted to the bar, but in con- 
seqaence of not having reached his majority, did not enter into practice 
until some months later. 

He commenced the business of his profession in Montpelier, Ver- 
mont, in 1803. He was at once recognized as the possessor of intellec- 
tual talents of the first order. Faithful to the interests of his clients, 
perceiving at once the strong points in their cases, and having the rare 
faculty of presenting in a natural, logical and harmonious order and 
arrangement, the facts of a case to the court and the jury, he soon took 
a high rank as a successful advocate and counselor. His business con- 
sequently increased, and became extensive and lucrative. 



■) 



YlS SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

Ill the year 1^04, he married Lucretia Houghton, eldest daughter of 
Mr. Edwiiid f luughton, of Northtield, Massachusetts, a lady of superior 
domestic accomplishments, of great energy, of rare kindness of heart 
and benevolence of life ; and her distinguished husband would not hesi- 
tate to ascribe to her constant, secret and pervading influence, in all the 
relations of the family, in relieving him from domestic cares, and in as- 
sisting him by her sympathy in all his public duties, much of the suc- 
cess and honor which have attended his career. 

As an advocate at the bar, Mr. Prentiss was confessedly superior to 
any other in the state. He was generally retained in the important 
cases, not only in his own county, but in the principal counties of the 
state. The more difficult and important the case, the more likely was 
he to appear in it as counsel for one of the parties. His manner and 
style of address, while not intended to captivate, was yet very attrac- 
tive and popular. To please was not the end for which he spoke, 
though he always attained that result. His enunciation was distinct, 
his language was the natural expression of his idea, and his arguments 
were always solid, intellectual, precise and systematic. He invariably 
treated the court with deference, the bar and all others with courtesy, 
and in popular opinion and speech, was regarded and mentioned as a 
remarkably " handsome speaker," a sound thinker, and a close logical 
reasoner. But with all his duties as a legal practitioner, Mr. Prentiss 
was yet daily a most studious reader of law. He read not merely 
for particular cases, but to establish himself in the great and universal 
principles of legal science. He thus furnished his mind for hi^lfuture 
career, and fitted himself to be a judge, while yet an attorney. 

In 1822, Mr. Prentiss declined the office of associate judge of the 
Supreme Court of the state, which was tendered to him by the legis- 
lature. His reasons were, his feeble health and unwillingness to 
relinquish a lucrative profession for the cares of an office that, beside 
the honor and responsibility, had little else to commend it to his accept- 
ance. In 1824, the citizens of the town in which he resided, evinced 
their confidence in him by electing him their representative in the state 
legislature. The subsequent year, the honor was again conferred upon 
him. His course in the legislature was marked by such wisdom and 
judgment, that the General Assembly elected him to the office of first 
associate judge of the ^tate court. As the former objections he had 
urged were in part removed, and as the judiciary system of the state 
had been newly and more efficiently organized, he accepted the office 
and held it four years. 

As judge of the state court, he secured the confidence and the respect 
of the bar. His eminent fitness for the office was confessed by all. His 
previous studies rendered him familiar with legal precedents and princi- 
ples, and he found in this office employment for the gathered stores of 
years. Nor did his great knowledge and quick insight into the merits 
of 3 case, render him impatient in hearing evidence or the arguments 
of counsel. He was always courteous and forbearing, and elevated the 
dignity of the court by securing the profound regard and affection of the 
members of the bar. His decisions were statements of facts and of 
law, in the most clear and convincing form, and he had the rare art of 
80 stating the facts, and applying the principles of law to them, that his 



<^' 
k 



SAMUEL PRENTISS, OF VERMONT. 719 

decisions carried with them the most satisfactory arguments for their 
correctness. It was this art, so necessary to a judge, that rendered him 
so successful as an advocate. It was the power of clearly discriminat- 
ing between facts and fictions, between tihings proved and things not 
proved, and of accurately and perfectly expressing in language his 
perceptions, and of arranging and classifying his ideas, in the most 
natural, simple and logical order, that eminently fitted him for the right 
and able discharge of the responsibilities of a judicial station. And 
having this power, added to extensive and profound legal knowledge, 
and combined with great conscientiousness, and with a lofty courteous- 
ness and kindness of manner, it is not strange that he should be both a 
sound and a popular jurist. Nor were his distinguished qualities as a 
judge without due appreciation. In consequence of his acknowledged 
ability, he was elected to the office of chief justice in the same court, 
by the General Assembly, in 1829. In this position he increased his 
already high reputation, and gave a wide character to the judiciary of 
the state. In this capacity, his decisions have attracted attention out 
of the state, and been noticed in other courts as of great legal weight 
and value. In 1830, Mr. Prentiss was summoned from this office, which 
he had so ably and gracefully sustained, to represent the state in the 
senate of the United States. 

His personal popularity, always known to be great, was made espe- 
cially manifest by the favor and support he received from all parts of 
the state, particularly from his own county, both in and out of the legis- 
lature, each time he was a candidate for the national senate. But his 
popularity was never acquired by the sacrifice of personal independence, 
nor by stooping to the low acts of a popular leader or demagogue. The 
confidence reposed in him, and the attachment manifested for him, were 
founded upon qualities of intrinsic value and excellence. He took his 
seat in the senate in 1831. 

There may have been in the senate, when he became a member of 
that body, gentlemen of more varied scholarship, and of more bril- 
liant forensic powers than he possessed. But there were few in that 
chamber, replete as it then was with men of intelligence, and genius, 
and eloquence, and of profound judicial and legal attainments, who 
equaled Mr. Prentiss in the symmetry of his mind, in the union of the 
most varied excellencies, in the harmonious blending of intellectual and 
moral powers, in the firmness of his principles, and in the fervor of un- 
questioned and intelligent patriotism. There were, perhaps, many who 
shone brighter by reason of a single great quality, but none who sur- 
passed him in the serene combination of those faculties which consti- 
stitute and render illustrious the character of a true statesman. Neither 
in the senate, nor elsewhere, was he ever marked for those splendid 
popular qualities which attract instant admiration, and with which some 
oi' his associates were gifted in the highest degree ; but he possessed 
those peculiar powers which rendered him equal to any station, and 
would prove him to be a superior man, even in the highest position. 
No office would reflect more honor upon him than his character would 
reflect upon the office. 

His course in the senate was uniformly self-consistent, wise and con- 
ciliatory. Holding to the views of the more moderate men at the North, 



720 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

with regard to our southern institutions, and once under the necessity 
of defending his own state and its resolutions from the aspersions of 
members from the South, he yet accomplished his duty in such a way 
as to win the esteem and confidence of his opponents, sustain the honor 
of his constituency, and preserve his own ■ simplicity and integrity. 
Though compelled to enter into discussion upon the exciting topics of 
the day, and to advocate the power and the constitutional right of Con- 
gress to abolish the slave trade and slavery in the district of Columbia ; 
and the right of petition, and the corresponding obligation to receive 
petitions from the people ; and to resist, to the utmost of his strength, 
the projects for the annexation of Texas, he yet conducted himself in so 
courteous, dignified and lofty a manner, as invariably to conciliate the 
extremes from both sections of the country ; to command the attention, 
and respect, and admiration, of all who listened to his speeches ; to vin- 
dicate the propriety and rectitude of his own course, and sustain his 
reputation for wisdom and sagacity. 

While a member of the senate he was appointed on several of the 
standing committees; such as the committee on the judiciary, the com- 
mittee on public lands, and the committee on patents and the patent 
office. 

As a member of the committee on public lands, he advocated the bill 
for the distribution of the proceeds arising from the sale of the public 
domain among the several states. He considered that the compacts 
of cession under the confederation guarantied to the particular states 
their proportionate share in the proceeds of the public lands ; and that 
the substitution of the present constitution and government in the place 
of the confederation, did not impair the right of the states to the fund. 
He regarded the provisions of the constitution as confirming all the an- 
tecedent rights springing out of the compacts of cession ; and argued 
that the public territory was a binding trust held by the government 
of the United States for the benefit of the particular states, " according 
to their respective proportions in the general charge and expenditure." 
Hence he opposed the project for donating the public lands to the states 
in which they were located, and urged the distribution of their proceeds 
as the only measure that was just and harmonious with the constitution. 
His speeches on this subject were marked by great clearness and force 
of argument, and discovered a power of stating and elucidating difficult 
propositions, that was not surpassed by any one in the senate. 

As a member of the committee on the judiciary, to whom the sub- 
ject was referred, he reported a bill directing a new edition of the laws 
of the United States to be compiled and printed, and accompanied the 
bill with a written report, explaining at length its provisions, objects, 
and advantages. The bill was passed by the senate, but no action was 
had upon it in the house. The utility of such a compilation of the 
laws has since become so apparent, that the executive, if our recollec- 
tion does not fail us, has recently thought fit to call the attention of J 
Congress to it. ' 

In the session of 1834 and '35, as well as in that of 1833 and '34, he } 

•was one of the select committee, of which Mr. Webster was chairman, ,: 

to whom was referred the bill for the satisfaction of claims due Ameri- j 

can citizens for spoliations committed on their commerce prior to Sep- ' 



SAMDEL PRENTItoS, OF VERMONT. Y21 

tember 30, 1800. The bill was reported upon favorably by the com 
mittee, and, after long debate, was passed by the senate. Mr. Pren- 
tiss advocated the bill in a speech, presenting, in a plain and condensed 
view, the whole merits of the matter, and demonstrating very fully 
and clearly the equity and justice of the claims, and the obligation of 
the government to pay them. He argued, that the claims of the United 
States for indemnity from France, for spoliations on our commerce, 
were just — were so admitted by France, and were surrendered to that 
government as an equivalent for the correspondent release of the United 
States from certain important national obligations; and that, therefore, 
the government of the United States, having appropriated an indem- 
nity due on account of spoliations committed on private property, as 
an offset to claims on the part of France, growing out of national obli- 
gations imposed upon the United States by treaties, was bound, ac- 
cording to the fundamental law of the land as well as by the principles 
of national justice, to make compensation to the injured individuals. 
Such was the substance of his argument, and on such a basis he advo- 
cated the measure as necessary to preserve inviolate the national honor 
and rectitude. 

The nice sense of justice and honor which characterize Mr. Prentiss 
was exhibited also on another subject, somewhat similar in its nature. 
Seeing how much of the time of Congress was occupied in legislating 
upon private claims, the great delays and expense to which the claim- 
ants were subjected, and the injustice often done them, and in many in- 
stances, the government, by such legislation, Mr. Prentiss, in January, 
1837, in order to correct the evil, obtained leave to bring in a bill to 
establish a board of commissioners, to hear and examine claims against 
the United States. This bill he introduced to the senate at every sub- 
sequent session, so long as he remained in that body. It was passed 
by the Senate at three different sessions ; but at neither was there any 
final action had upon it in the House of Representatives. 

Mr. Prentiss is the author of the existing act of Congress against 
dueling in the District of Columbia. He drew up, introduced, and car- 
ried the bill through the senate. The time chosen for its introduction, 
and the manner in which it was urged upon the attention of the senate 
and of the country, were both equally appropriate and forcible. It was 
soon after the duel between Hon. William J. Graves, of Kentucky, 
and Hon. Jonathan Cilley, of New-Hampshire, both members of the 
House of Representatives. No one who heard Mr. Prentiss on this oc- 
casion, but had their respect raised to admiration for his strength of 
principle, perfection of argument, and calm but finished and subduing 
eloquence. On this bill he made three speeches : the first, upon intro- 
ducing it; the second, in reply to objections; and the third, on the 
general merits of the bill. When we consider the event which was 
the immediate occasion of the bill, and the emotions which it caused 
throughout the circles at Washington, and through the entire country, 
we may estimate to some extent the effect which was produced when 
Mr. Prentiss, evidently influenced by no mere impulse of overwrought 
sensibility, but by permanent and enduring principles, that were only 
called into action by the occasion, rose in his place and proposed a bill 
designed to suppress dueling, by attaching to it an infamous penalty ; 

46 



722 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

and concluded his remarks, by calling upon " senators, grave and con- 
siderate senators, heads of families, fathers of the land, to interpose 
their authority and influence to stay a practice unsuited to an enlight- 
ened age, and revolting to the moral and religious feelings of the coun- 
try ; and invoked them, by their regard for those on whom the hopes 
of the country rest ; by their regard to eternal and immutable princi- 
ples of moral rectitude; by every consideration of justice and humanity; 
•by the duty they owed to God and their country ; to give aid and sup^ 
port to a measure, demanded by the moral sense of the nation ; essen- 
tial to personal security, and to the preservation of law, liberty and so- 
•cial order." 

\ It was, however, in the speech on the general merits of the bill, that he 
evinced most fully both his intellectual power and the purity and elevation 
of his principles. His peroration was remarkably impressive and effective 
both in its style and idea; nor need we ever despair of the safety and 
glory of our Republic and its institutions, so long as such men shall stand 
in our public councils, and affirm that the high principles of justice must 
never yield to the factious demands, however clamorous or importu- 
nate, of party policy or political expediency. The conclusion of that 
speech we cannot forbear to give, confident that it needs no other apo- 
logy for its insertion here than its intrinsic truth and beauty — than the 
high moral lessons it conveys. And we can almost see his tall person 
animated, and his eye kindling under the vigor and almost prophetic 
nature of his own sentiments, and hear his voice, ordinarily feeble, be- 
come clear and sonorous under the influence of the lofty ideas he is ut- 
tering, as he concludes : " Sir, public men and the people everywhere 
must case to undervalue the worth of moral excellence and virtue, and 
learn to consider that the want of these cannot be compensated by 
genius however brilliant, by learning however extensive, nor by any 
advantages, however fascinating and valuable in themselves, which either 
the bounty of nature, the power of industry, or the most accomplished 
education can bestow. In short, if we wish to maintain the free institu- 
tions of the country — if we wish to preserve purity in the government — 
if we wish to continue and perpetuate civil and political liberty — if we 
wish to uphold the character and honor of the country, and give it a 
name surpassing every name among the nations of the earth, we must 
remember and constantly act upon the great truth taught by Infallible 
Wisdom, thatt/ is righteousness which exalteth a nation, while sin is a re- 
proach unto any people. We must remember that it is an axiom, 
founded in the soundest philosophy, and verified by all authentic his- 
tory, that as vice and immorality in private life invariably destroy indi- 
vidual character and usefulness, whatever intellectual endowments may 
accompany them, so, if favored and tolerated in public life, and among 
public men, they will inevitably infect and corrupt the general mass of 
the community, induce criminal insubordination to the laws, undermine 
the conservative and sustaining principles of the social compact, and ul- 
timately lead to national dishonor, degradation, and ruin." 

Mr. Prentiss was one of the two senators belonging to his party who 
refused to sustain, and used all his influence against, the passage of the 
celebrated Bankrupt Act of 1840. In a speech, delivered in the Senate, 
in a general argument against the merits of the bill, he showed profound 



BAMDEL PUENTISS, OF VERMONT. 723 

acquaintance with the English system of common and statute law, and 
a comprehensive sagacity with respect to the results of the measure, 
should it be carried into operation. His speech on this occasion was 
said bj Mr. Calhoun to have been the clearest and most unanswerable 
argument to which the latter had listened for many years on any de- 
batable question. While confident that the provisions of the bill were 
unjust and likely to work mischief, "kindness to the few and cruelty to 
the many," he yet rested his objections to it principally upon its moral 
tendencies and influences. He considered it as aiming a direct blow at 
the indefeasible rights of property, which lie at the foundation of the so- 
cial system, and tending to induce fraud and dishonesty in the commu- 
nity. In his view it seemed to legalize the breaking of contracts, and 
destroy individual and public credit. A short experience of the law 
disclosed his wisdom and the soundness of his arguments, and its fail- 
ure to produce any beneficial results verified his predictions. It grew 
out of a false and one-sided philanthropy that overlooked moral dis- 
tinctions and personal rights, and consequently had soon to be repealed. 

Mr. Prentiss, having honored himself in his state for two successive 
terms of six years in the United States Senate, was nominated by the 
President to the^ office of Judge of the District Court of the United 
States, for Vermont. The nomination was sent to the Senate on the 
8th of April, 1842; and on the same day, immediately on its being 
received, the Senate went into executive session, and, without the usual 
reference of the subject to a committee, confirmed the nomination by a 
resolution declaring that they '•^unanimously'''' advised and consented to 
the appointment. This circumstance attending his appointment was 
gratifying as it was unusual, and showed the impression that the charac- 
ter and abilities of Mr. Prentiss had made upon his associates. His 
resignation was communicated to the Senate three days subsequently 
to the nomination and appointment. The sentiments which were freely 
expressed on the floor of that body when his letter of resignation was 
read, are those with which he has equally inspired all who have known 
him. It is said that senators of all parties vied with each other in ex- 
pressing their opinions of his eminent fitness for the office, and their 
regrets that a man so pure and firm, of so much soundness of mind and 
views, of so much and such rare delicacy of conscientiousness — a man 
as necessary to the Senate as he would be useful on the bench, was to 
be removed from among them. The tone of the public journals on his 
retiring from the Senate was equally complimentary and just, and even 
party animosity never ventured to impugn the appointment. 

Judge Prentiss took his seat upon the bench of the District Court 
in May, 1842. This position he has occupied for ten years, and has 
discharged its functions with signal propriety and ability. Several of 
his decisions in important cases have been published, in connection 
with the reports of the State Supreme Court, and some have been re- 
published in the Law Reporter, and also in the New- York Legal 
Observer. The decisions in the cases referred to display great clear- 
ness, discrimination, and depth of thought. They are learned and 
valuable, and show great legal knowledge and acumen, and entitle him 
to a high rank among the jurists of our country, and to a high fame in 
the history of its jurisprudence. The intellectual and moral qualities, 



724 



SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 



and the legal attainments of Judge Prentiss, eminently fit him for the 
highest judicial station. Calm, reflective, discriminating, upright — ol 
quick and delicate sensibilities — of rare knowledge of men and motives ; 
mild and considerate — profoundly attached to law, and yet never using 
its forms and technicalities to prevent or pervert justice ; conscious 
that the letter killeth and the spirit giveth life, and that equity and 
right are the end of law, he unites, in fine proportion, those seemingly 
opposite qualities of rectitude and charity, of justice and forbearance, 
of inflexible principle and humane emotions, whose perfect combination 
can alone qualify a 7nan to be a judge among his fellows. And such is 
his acknowledged fairness and justice, that even his neighbors, who are 
most opposed to his general political opinions, would never dare to im- 
pugn his impartiality. Said a neighbor of the judge to the writer, after 
a somewhat warm discussion on the recent Fugitive Slave Bill, " If 
I were a fugitive, I should not wish to be tried by Judge Prentiss." 
" But if you were falsely charged with being a fugitive?" said the writer. 
" Then," he replied quickly, " I should not fear to trust my case in his 
hands." 

The discipline to which Judge Prentiss subjected himself from the 
commencement of his practice at the bar, the character of his studies, 
and the manner and object with which he pursued them, would all in- 
dicate that he would be able to discharge the public duties of his office 
to universal acceptance. And such has been the case; and such and 
so high is the reputation he has attained in the office he at present 
occupies, that he has been frequently and publicly mentioned as a com- 
petent person for a seat on the bench of the Supreme Court of the 
United States. In two instances, when there has been a vacancy on 
that bench, many of his friends have strongly urged him to consent 
that his name might be presented for the nomination ; but in both in- 
stances he resisted the solicitation of his friends, and exerted his in- 
fluence for another gentleman. He was advanced in years, and already 
worn with toil in the public service, and desired to pass the rest of his 
life in repose and quiet. The honors and emoluments of such an office 
were not deemed an equivalent for its wearing and exhausting labors. 
The duties of his present i)ffice are not so onerous but that he can dis- 
charge them with great fidelity, and the performance of them furnishes 
an agreeable and healthful excitement to his mind. 

Judge Prentiss has always taken a warm interest in the judicial insti. 
tutions of his adopted state. While at the bar, he was earnest and 
active in favor of every useful improvement in the judiciary system, 
which, as then existing, was essentially defective. And when a mem- 
ber of the legislature, in 1824, he proposed and urged, in concurrence 
with the other members of the Judiciary Committee, the act which was 
then passed providing for an entire reorganization of the courts. In 
1825, in the same position, he succeeded in defeating an attempt made to 
repeal it. The new system then went into operation, and has continued 
in existence, commanding almost universal approbation and support, 
down to the present day. And he is still watchful of every movement 
calculated to disturb or impair the judicial institutions and character of 
the state. He has opposed, at every step, the encroachments of those 
popular influences and measures, which, by submitting the election of 



SAMUEL PRENTISS, OF VERMONT. 725 

judicial officers directly to the people, render less certain and uniform 
the administration of justice, strip the judiciary of its sanctity, and open 
it to the inroads of political excitement and party animosity. 

The tendency of the duties and studies of a high judicial station is to 
purify, and elevate, and strengthen the moral sense, and to inspire re- 
spect and reverence for those immutable moral principles which are 
essential to the welfare of man and the peace of society. That tendency 
has been fully developed in Judge Prentiss. Purity of life, in every 
relation, is of prime importance in the character of a public man. 
Without it, genius, learning, wit, eloquence, and cultivation, are worse 
than in vain. They add only to the length of the lever by which vice 
dissolves the fabric of individual character and social welfare. And we 
conceive it to be the highest eulogium we can bestow upon Mr. Prentiss, 
to say that he is a pure man and a pure judge. 

A republican, he dislikes ultra-democracy, and reveres the constitu- 
tion, and loves the union of states, whose permanence it guarantees. 
A patriot and a statesman, he has no ambitious hopes for the nation — 
no desires for its territorial extension and aggrandizement — no dreams 
that it is the heaven-commissioned apostle of liberty and democracy to the 
other nations of the earth. He knows that " patriotism is a necessary 
link in the golden chain of human affections and virtues," and turns 
away with indignant scorn from that false philosophy or mistaken reli- 
gion which would persuade him that cosmopolitism is nobler than na- 
tionality, that philanthropy is greater than patriotism, and the human 
race a sublimer object of love than his own country and his own 
people. The history of the past, which he reverences, not so much for 
what it is in itself as for the lecsons that it teaches to the present, leads 
him to expect, that should our own country ever become the propa- 
gandist of liberty among the nations, or seek to become the centre of 
light and freedom to all mankind, it would soon lose its independence 
and nationality. 

Judge Prentiss is still living in Montpelier, Vt. His life is quiet, 
simple, unostentatious. He has the respect and confidence of the com- 
munity, and is a member, with his wife, of the Congregational Church 
in that place. To the profession of Christianity he adds a hearty faith 
in its doctrines, and a cheering hope in its promises. That hope is more 
satisfying to his mind than any expectation of posthumous fame — than 
any certainty that his name will be held in fragrant remembrance so 
long as the people of the state and land shall be taught to revere 
" whatsoever things are true, and just, and honorable, and lovely, and 
of good report." 



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JOHN ADAMS KNOWLBS, OF MASSACHUSETTS. 727 



JOHN ADAMS KNOWLES, 

OF LOWELL, MASS., PRESIDENT OF THE APPLETON BANK. 

In an age when it is more difficult to find readers for books than 
books for readers, the life of one whose course has been devoid of any 
remarkable incident or striking peculiarity, will present no claim to 
public attention, except as it furnishes an instance of practical success, 
attending sagacity, perseverance, and high-minded and honorable 
principle. To a young man, struggling amid the difficulties which so 
often beset the beginning of his career, a knowledge of such an exam- 
ple is the best legacy which he can receive. 

Mr. Knowles was born in Pembroke, in New-Hampshire, April 25, 
1800. He was the youngest of thirteen children born to a farmer of 
very limited means, and all but one lived to mature years. At the 
age of fifteen he left home, by his father's permission, to seek his for- 
tune in the world, amid the disadvantages of no means of support, of 
feeble health, and an imperfect education. 

A five years' experiment at various mechanical employments con- 
vinced him that he had not the physical stamina to enable him to per- 
form the labor requisite in such pursuits, and turned his attention to 
the hope of earning a living by some other method than the labor of 
his hands. 

A native thirst for knowledge was now gratified and strengthened in 
a private school kept by John O. Ballard, Esq., in Hopkinton, New- 
Hampshire. His connection with this teacher he remembers as one of 
the fortunate circumstances of his life. Mr. Ballard was a gentleman 
between fifty and sixty years of age; and, besides being eminently 
qualified as an experienced instructor to aid his pupils in acquiring mere 
book learning, he had been engaged for several years in commercial 
transactions, which gave him a fund of practical information, and an en- 
larged knowledge of the world. It may encourage other teachers in 
like circumstances to know, that his generous readiness to impart good 
counsel was appreciated, perhaps, by more than one young pupil, who 
in after years remembered and profited by his advice. 

As soon as Mr. Knowles was competent to teach a common country 
school, he availed himself of the slender assistance which that employ- 
ment yields. He continued teaching and studying until he was twenty- 
four years old, by which time he had read through the usual course ot 
studies preparatory for admission to college. At that advanced age, 
destitute of means, and still in feeble health, he deemed it neither pru- 
dent nor right to incur the expense of a liberal education, but entered 
instead upon an itinerant course of teaching, with the double purpose or 
strengthening his constitution, and enlaiging his knowledge of the 
world. 

In the autumn of 1827 he came to Lowell, Mass. This manufactur- 
ing village at that time numbered only three thousand inhabitants, and 
had only the year before been incorporated as a town. It was fortunate 
for Mr. Knowles that he came at that time to this fresh and vigorous. 



728 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. ™ 

community, and here fixed himself to grow up with its growth, and 
share its prosperity. 

Soon relinquishing an evening school in which he had been engaged, 
he entered his name as a student-at-law in the office of Elisha Glidden, 
Esq., December 10, 1827. Here he performed the duties of a clerk, 
and read the usual elementary books, until 1830, when he went to 
Dedham, Mass., to attend the lectures of the Hon. Theron Metcalf, 
now one of the Justices of the Supreme Court of Massachusetts. Mr. 
Metcalf 's lectures on law were held in high repute, and here Mr. 
Knowles acquired a more thorough knowledge of the theory of his pro- 
fession, as the business in the office of a good lawyer had before given 
him instruction in its practical details. 

In 1832 he was admitted to the bar. He immediately opened an 
office in Lowell ; and from that time until 1847, when he retired from 
the active business of the profession, he never knew the want of clients. 

In 1833 he was married to a daughter of William Appleton, late of 
Portsmouth, N. H. In 1835 he was chosen a representative of the 
town of Lowell in the Massachusetts Legislature, and in 1844, 1845, he 
represented the city of Lowell in the same body. In 1847 he was a 
senator from Middlesex county in the Massachusetts Senate, but de- 
clined a nomination in 1848, as he had been chosen treasurer of the 
Lowell and Lawrence Rail-road, and president of the Appleton Bank, in 
Lowell, which two offices he still holds. 

The bare names of these places of honor and trust will indicate, even 
to the stranger, traits of-character, marked by intelligence, probity, con- 
fidence, which have entitled him to public respect, as they will intimate 
also a position of ease and independence in regard to worldly wealth ; while 
the contrast between the last seventeen years of success and the previous 
seventeen years of struggle, suggests the important inquiry, by what 
means this success was wrought out ? 

Of course, we cannot speak of the living as we do of the dead ; yet 
we should hardly be excused if in this connection we did not refer to 
an honesty and integrity never sullied by the breath of suspicion — to a 
sagacious attention to business, which, even amid the constant draw- 
back of ill health, has been most exemplary, and to an urbanity and 
amenity which have always smoothed even the most perplexing trans- 
actions. As a proof of this it may be named, that in the hundreds of real- 
estate transactions in which he has been engaged, in looking after his 
own property or managing that of others, he never had a lawsuit grow 
out of any one of them, or even a serious difficulty ; while, in his pro- 
fession, so little litigious has been his temper, that his rule seems always 
to have been to keep his clients away from a lawsuit, if that were possi- 
ble ; or, if not, to get them out of it as soon as he could. 

It is to the high praise of the legal profession that it has furnished so 
many men who have fell that they owed a duty to the public in the ad- 
vocacy of those causes which tend to promote good order and good 
morals. The subject of this brief sketch has not been behind his bre- 
thren in the discharge of this duty. His aid has been ready in the pro- 
motion of any public good. In the cause of temperance, especially, he 
has labored with zeal and perseverance. His interest in the religious 
education of the young he has proved by sustaining, for years, the office 



JOHN ADAMS KNOWLES, OF MASSACHUSETTS. 729 

of superintendent of a Sunday-school ; and when we speak of him as a 
professing Christian, and an officer in a Christian church, it will be un- 
derstood that he himself has been a pupil in a school where we may 
learn the highest virtues of our humanity. 

There are some goddesses which are most successfully wooed by in- 
direct approaches to them. Health is best sought by thinking nothing 
about it. Happiness flies from the man who is bent upon seeking it, 
and comes of its own accord to him who is wisely pursuing other ends. 
And something like this is true of wealth. The man who is determined 
to be rich, and seeks no end but gain, almost always overdoes the mat- 
ter, as a thousand greedy but penniless speculators all over the land 
bear witness. Mr. Knowles is an illustration of the success a man will 
meet with who regulates his affairs by correct moral principles, and 
trusts to these principles for the result; and if they bring with them, 
when followed, first of all, for their own sake alone, a reward " in the 
life that now is," the consequence will not surprise those who have faith 
in a certain old word of promise. 

It would be pleasant to enter the domestic group, and the little circle 
of friends, where he is greatly beloved, and m which his humor and wit 
afford a genial mirth ; but we feel that there we hardly have any right 
to enter ; and here we must close our sketch of one who, starting with 
nothing but feeble health, has, at the early age of fifly-two, attained a 
position of useful and honored success. Sic itur ad astra. 




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HENRY PIRTLE, OF KENTUCKY. 731 

HON. HENRY TIRTLE, 

OF LOUISVILLE, KENTUCKY. 

Henry Pirtle was born on the 5th of November, 1798, in Washing- 
ton county, Kentucky. 

His father was of German and Welsh descent. On his mother's 
side he was descended from a Swedish family, who had been at the 
court of Gustavus Adolphus, and coincided with that great prince 
in his grand scheme of spreading pure Christianity over the western 
world. They were his missionaries, and were included in the patent 
issued by Christiana, his daughter, or rather, by Chancellor Oxenstiem, 
in 1638, in fulfilment of the wish of Gustavus, for the country lying on 
the west side of the Delaware River, now principally in the State of 
Delaware. 

His parents were among the early settlers in Kentucky. In a letter 
written by him in 1840, in answer to an invitation to be present at the 
celebration of the anniversary of the first settlement of the state, on the 
24th of May, at Boonsborough, on the Kentucky River, he gives a strik- 
ing picture of the daring energy, and spirit of adventure, which so 
strongly characterized the first immigrants to that country. Speaking 
of his father and mother, he says : " If my egotism obeyed my affec- 
tion and reverence for their memory, I could say they were something 
of a specimen (I speak now of adventure only) of the first immigrants. 
They were Virginians. In those days, it was the habit for the persons 
who intended to come to this country, to rendezvous for fifty or one 
hundred miles around, at some place appointed, and travel in company 
with arms in their hands. My parents, who had been recently married 
very young, had come to one of these points of meeting, and found 
they had mistaken the day — that the company had gone two days be- 
fore. But, as they had set out to come to Kentucky, and had received 
the blessing of their friends at the home they had wept for at parting, they 
resolved that they would not turn back — they would coine to Kentucky 
— and accordingly, my father, with his rifle on his shoulder, on one 
horse, and a pack under him, and my mother on another horse, and a 
pack under her, traversed the solitary wilderness, and crossed the moun- 
tains alone; not on the "old wilderness road," but along the old wil 
derness path, till they reached the Crab Orchard. I fear their son, who 
writes this, would not readily take such a journey. Then every rustle 
in the leaves or crack of a stick in the deep woods, might well have 
been taken for the whereabouts of the prowling savage," 

John Pirtle, the father of the subject of this sketch, was a man whose 
character was strongly marked by firmness, integrity, and decision, 
united with great mental vigor. He possessed a very remarkable 
talent for mathematical reasoning, and well understood the value of 
such training to the youthful mind, and very early imbued his son with 
his own love of learning ; and from his instruction, aided only by such 
schools as the neighborhood afforded, he received a good English edu- 



•732 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

cation. He seems to have inherited some of his father's uncommon 
talent for mathematical science : for while at school, when he was only 
sixteen years old, he invented a plan, not before known, of ascertaining 
the rising and setting of the sun in any latitude where the days are only 
twenty-four hours long. 

Until he was eighteen he lived entirely in the country, sometimes 
working on the farm, sometimes going to school, and at other times 
spending days together roaming the " pathless woods," either on sur- 
veying expeditions, or with his gun ; and often merely for the pleasure 
it afforded him. There is much in this communion with nature to ele- 
vate and purify the mind of a thoughtful youth. Born in this beautiful 
country, while yet much of its primeval sublimity was left as nature 
made it — splendid, and almost awful, in its tall forests, tangled and dark 
woods, its wild rivers and romantic tributaries, he imbibed a love of 
nature which has been a poetic, as well as a patriotic sentiment of his 
life. "Patriotism," we have heard him say, "is the love of the great 
trees, the bright streams, the rivers, the forests, the green fields, our 
beautiful women, our countrymen, and our laws." 

He was attracted by the moral science of the law, and determined 
to make it his profession ; and when very young he commenced its 
study at Bardstown, under the instruction of the late Hon. John Rowan, 
one of the most eminent jurists of the west. His talents, assiduity, and 
uniform correctness of deportment, secured to him the friendship of his 
preceptor, which continued while he lived, and was reciprocated with 
the warmest gratitude and veneration by his pupil. In his preparatory 
studies, before he entered the profession, he went through a very full 
course. In that day there were no Kent's Commentaries, or Story's 
Commentaries, so valuable to the student ; nor had he the help of other 
American and English publications, which have since contributed so 
much to facilitate legal study. But he had to find his way through the 
labyrinth of law and equity with labor not now befalling our young 
men. He did not rely on such elementary books as the day afforded ; 
but, in connection with them, he read the reports in law and equity 
from the time of Edward the Sixth to the middle of the reign of George 
the Third. 

While pursuing with ardor the study of his profession, he did not 
neglect the advantages of the large and well-selected library of his pre- 
ceptor. Scientific works, history, philosophy and poetry, were his 
relaxation. 

After reading for about three years, fourteen hours a day, he ap- 
peared at the bar, and had a full share of business the first term. He 
was young, almost beardless, but he understood his profession much 
better than most beginners. He bad a remarkably manly, sonorous 
voice, agreeable and impressive elocution, and a power of analysis 
which commanded success. His office was in Hartford, Ohio county, 
but he attended all the courts of a large circuit. In the Green River 
Country, (as it is called,) the principal sources of litigation at that time, 
■which were profitable to the bar, were conflicting land claims; and, as 
Mr. Pirtle was very familiar with the land law, he had, while this sort 
of business lasted, a full practice. But at the end of five years, most 
of these claims being adjusted, he determined to remove to Louisville. 



HENRY PIRTLE, OF KENTUCKY. V33 

A few months after his settlement in Louisville, the office of judge 
of the General Court of the fifth district becoming vacant, he was 
unanimously recommended by the bar to the executive to fill the va- 
cancy, when he was only twenty-seven years of age, although this office 
was one of great importance: the General Court having jurisdiction 
throughout the state in suits between residents and non-residents, and 
in all the revenue cases, (being a court of exchequer,) and the Circuit 
Court having an unlimited jurisdiction over life and property, of law 
and equity. And what made the compliment greater, a senior member 
of the bar was appointed a committee to go to Frankfort, procure the 
commission, and bring it to him. 

This office he held for upwards of five years, when he resigned it, 
and assumed the practice at the bar, having established himself in pub- 
lic estimation as one of the leading jurists of the state. This was 
honor; for Kentucky has always had able men at her bar and on her 
bench. 

While holding the Circuit Court for the county of Meade, in the year 
1827, on a conviction for murder, he ordered the judgment to be ar- 
rested for a defect in the indictment, and thereupon ordered the com- 
mitment of the prisoner to await a new indictment. This astonished 
the counsel ; and the Hon. Ben. Hardin, a counselor of as much expe- 
rience as any in the commonwealth, expressed his surprise, and stated 
to the judge that it was the first time in the state an accused person 
had not been discharged in such an instance, under that clause in the 
constitution which provided, that no one should be twice put in jeo- 
pardy for the same offence. But the judge maintained that the party 
was not "put in jeopardy" within the meaning of the constitution, on 
a bad indictment ; and the law has been so held in the state ever since. 

In 1830, a trial for felony took place before Judge Pirtle, in which 
the often mooted question concerning the opinion formed by one called 
as a juror, came up; and he decided, that if the person called had 
formed an opinion one way or the other as to the verdict that should 
be rendered, he could not sit on the trial, if others who had formed no 
opinion could be obtained. It seems from the report of the case in 
seventh Monroe's Reports, that this opinion was not founded on the com- 
mon law only, but was based in part on the provisions of the consti- 
ttutlon of Kentucky, which are substantially included in the constitu- 
tions of the different states of the Union, and in the constitution of the 
United States. 

We have not space to insert the whole of this opinion ; but we give 
the following extracts, which show the result to which the learned judge 
came: 

" But, if the doctrine of impartiality were not sustained by the de- 
cisions of the courts at Westminster, it still has been abundantly pro- 
tected by the American statesmen and jurists. In this country, more 
than any other, has the trial by jury been cherished and improved. 
The constitution of almost every state has secured its impartiality by 
special clause. The constitution of the United States has the same 
provision. And the courts of America, in expounding these provisions, 
have held forth the lights of modern improvement, and shown that 
American justice requires a juryman whose opinion is not formed by 



734 SKKTOHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

any means that govern the human mind, before he hears the evidence 
in the case which he is called to try. 

" We are not under the necessity to recur to the British common 
law for the exposition of an American charter." 

" The court does not mean to say, that every hypothetical opinion 
which a juror may have will disqualify him, (for this might exclude all 
mankind that come within the reach of the court,) as that, if what his 
neighbors have said be true, or if what is rumored be true, then he 
has formed an opinion. But, if his opinion is absolutely formed, and 
his mind made up, it makes no difference on what grounds, he is an 
incompetent juryman. But, it may be said, that the more atrocious 
and notorious an offence is, the more difficulty there will be to obtain 
a jury ; and in some instances of outbreaking enormity, it may be im- | 

possible. Not so. That there will be more difficulty is acknowledged ; i 

but the injunction to preserve impartiality will not compel the court to ' 

deny justice to the commonwealth. The constitution directs the trial 
to be had by 9. jury of the vicinage. It is the duty of the court to afford 
it there ; and if a jury, clear of all previous impression, cannot be ob- 
tained, it will be still the duty of the court to provide the most impar- 
tial triers which the constitution and laws have given the means to do." 

After he left the bench. Judge Pirtle engaged with his usual energy 
in the practice of the law,- in the courts of Louisville, and the Court of 
Appeals and Federal Court, at Frankfort; and with that success which 
generally attends high moral character, learning, ability, and industry. 

His eloquence is not splendid ; yet there has always been a clearness in 
his argument and a natural fervor, united with such illustration as reached 
the feelings and judgment of plain, sensible men ; so that, when enforced 
by his uncommon voice and manner, which we cannot express on paper, 
we may say he is truly an eloquent speaker. Mr. Clay, when oppo- 
site counsel in a great case, said to the jury : "The solemn force of the 
gentleman's manner is irresistible." But a few years ago he obtained 
a judgment of six thousand dollars on a breach of marriage promise, by 
the skilful presentation of the case, and the holding it up throughout 
the trial of seven days, in his fine address and manner alluded to by 
Mr. Clay, and by his argument and natural appeal to the jury. 

In 1846, the commission of judge, which he had resigned in 1832,*" 
with the same salary as that of Chief Justice of the State, was, at the 
same unanimous instance of the bar, sent to him. He held it for a 
few days to save the term of the court, and resigned it. 

He is now chancellor ; and he is the professor of constitutional law, 
equity, and commercial law, in the University of Louisville. 

The life of a professional man, who has kept himself in his profes- 
sion, is comparatively void of incidents to excite the mind of the gene- 
ral reader. Chancellor Pirtle has eschewed political office. His at- 
tachment to the law, and his domestic attachments and habits, have, 
with one exception, held him away from such station. Yet it is agree- 
able to men of reflection, to contemplate the course of one of their fel- 
lows "who has, for more than a quarter of a century, kept an even tenor 
of duty always in mind; and who has esteemed the fame of the party 



HENRY PIRTLE, OF KENTUCKY. V35 

politician less than the duties of the husband, the father, the jurist, and 
the judge. 

In 1840, he was induced by the voice of the district to take a seat in 
the senate of the state. This he did, with the express declaration that 
he could not continue in political office. He remained the appointed 
time in the senate, and returned to his constituents, meeting their ap- 
probation and satisfaction. 

In the year 1842, when he was chairman of the Committee on Feder- 
al Relations, he made a report on certain resolutions of South Carolina 
and Virginia, in reference to the conduct of New-York in regard to fu- 
gitive slaves from Virginia, in which he stated substantially the same 
doctrine, and the same construction of the Constitution of the United 
States, that is to be found in the opinion of the Supreme Court of the 
case of Prigg vs. The State of Pennsylvania, in 16th Peters' Reports, 
some days before the opinion was promulged. 

The following extracts will show the conclusion to which the argu- 
ment came. 

" These states claim the right to enforce New-York to an observance 
of the Constitution. South Carolina says: 'Interest, duty and honor, 
imperiously demand, that South Carolina announce to the authorities 
of New- York, that as soon as that state shall break its solemn faith to 
Virginia, so soon shall be canceled our constitutional obligations as to 
her. When a state shall have been disappointed of those rights and 
remedies, for which stipulation was made when the compact of union 
was adopted, then will the painful but imperative duty of protecting her 
rights in her own way have been imposed upon her. This state, having 
a common purpose and common interest with Virginia to uphold the 
Federal Constitution, by exacting compliance with its obligations, is 
prepared to make common cause with that commonwealth in the 
maintenance of her rights.' And again, ' the basis of the whole doctrine 
of state rights is the assumption that the Constitution of the United 
States is a compact between the states.' 

"Your committee deny that this is any just basis of state rights. 
The doctrine of the American people is not that the Constitution is a 
mere compact between the states, a breach of which on the part of one 
is to be remedied by coercive retaliation on the part of others ; but that 
it is a form of government of the people of this nation, as sovereign in 
its sphere as the government of a state is within its sphere ; that no 
state can interfere with its power or assume its action : that national 
subjects are under this government referred to national judicature. 

"Your committee believe that the duty of the respective states to 
comply with the provisions of the Constitution in regard to fugitives, is 
one to be enforced by the National Government, or it is left without a 
remedy ; for coercion on the part of another state implies disunion. 
Retaliatory exactions of compliance, with the obligations of the Consti- 
tution, are dangerous usurpations, to be deprecated by all the American 
people. 

"This act of Virginia and South Carolina is an interference with the 
power of Congress under the Constitution, ' to regulate commerce with 
foreign nations and among the several states.'' This power is not one 
that may be concurrently exercised by the states, as the preamble of 



736 BKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

South Carolina supposes ; but it is one to be exercised exclusively by- 
Congress. This American doctrine is so well established, that it would 
be vain to attempt to give it any support by argument at this day — 
See Federalist, No. 42; Kent's Commentaries, Lect. 19; 2 Story's 
Com. 512 ; 9 Wheaton's Reports, Gibbons vs. Ogden. Congress has 
passed laws regulating commerce among the states. They have said 
what papers a vessel shall have to pass from New- York to Charleston, 
and what papers she shall have at Charleston to be able to sail to New- 
York, and neither of the states can require any other. 

" The committee would not contend that South Carolina had not the 
right to inspect a vessel to see whether slaves were concealed on her or 
not ; this would be but the exercise of a power of police which is not 
denied to the states. But if the exercise of police has annexed to it 
restrictions aimed at navigation and commerce, then its character is 
changed, and it is inhibited by the Constitution. In this instance the 
power attempted to be exercised is for retaliation and compulsion, and 
burdens on navigation are imposed that come from no motive of po- 
lice. 

" Your committee have witnessed, with much concern, the difference 
between these states on these subjects. The quiet union of the Ameri- 
can states should strike every lover of mankind as a desideratum un- 
surpassed by any subject of sublunary concern ; and so it is felt by the 
people of Kentucky." 

Judge Pirtle unites, to his legal attainments, general information, 
which belongs only to the most industrious and cultivated in his pro- 
fession. His habits of investigation have led to a very thorough 
acquaintance with natural science ; and that refined element in his 
character to which we have before alluded, causes him to take great 
delight in all that is beautiful in literature and art. He has a lively 
interest in most of the scientific and philanthropic movements of the 
day. Indeed, those eloquent lines of Terence might be his own : " Ho- 
mo sum ; et nihil humani a me alienum puto." 




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ARCHIBALD DIXON, OF KENTUCKY. 737 

HON. ARCHIBALD DIXON, 

OF KENTUCKY. 

To write the biography of a living man is a task of difficulty and deli- 
cacy. To speak well of him would be deemed adulation by his ene- 
mies ; and to speak ill of him, no better than murder by his friends. 
In the following we shall endeavor to speak the truth, yet we will not 
deny that our prepossessions are in favor of our subject ; and must can- 
didly admit that if we had esteemed it our duty to condemn more than 
to praise, we should have left the work to other hands. As it is brief, 
it may not be tedious ; and as it is the life of one whose name has not 
yet been associated with national affairs, it may excite curiosity. 

Archibald Dixon, of Kentucky, was bom on the 2d of April, 1802, 
in the county of Caswell, North Carolina. His grandfather, Henry 
Dixon, was a colonel in the Revolutionary army ; and at the battle of 
Eutaw Springs received a wound from a cannot shot, which carried 
away a great part of one side of his face, and of which he after- 
wards died. 

Wynn Dixon, the son of Henry Dixon, and the father of the subject 
of this memoir, entered the army at the age of sixteen, as an ensign ; 
and for his gallant conduct and soldier-like bearing in the battles of 
Camden, Eutaw, and Guilford Court-house, was promoted to the rank 
of lieutenant, and served during the war. 

Mr. Dixon's mother was the daughter of David Hart, of North Caro- 
lina, and the niece of Colonel Thomas Hart, of Lexington, Kentucky, 
whose daughter is the wife of the Hon. Henry Clay. Wynn Dixon 
emigrated to Henderson county, Kentucky with his son, Archibald, in 
the year 1805, where he continued to reside until his death. He had 
once been wealthy, but in an unfortunate hour, becoming surety for 
his friend, he was reduced from affluence to indigence ; and he was un- 
able to do more for his son than to afford him a plain English educa- 
tion, such as was to be obtained in the neighborhood county schools. 
But it is not in the power of circumstances to depress the energies of a 
man who is determined to rise. Poverty and misfortune may delay, 
but cannot prevent his ultimate success. 

Mr. Dixon made good use of the few opportunities at his command ; 
and. though without that intellectual cultivation which is rarely to be 
acquired except within college walls, and which seems absolutely neces- 
sary with ordinary minds to smooth the pathway to professional 
eminence, at the early age of twenty entered upon the study of the 
law. 

His preceptor was Mr, James Hillyer, a gentleman of good legal 
attainments, and who possessed many excellent and noble qualities. 
With the use of a good library, and an occasional hint from Mr. Hill- 
yer, Mr. Dixon made rapid progress in his studies. His whole heart 
was in the work. His days and nights were devoted to the prosecution 
of a science which, to a beginner, seems to be made up of recondite 

47 



V38 SKETCHES OF EMIlfENT AMBRICANS. 

principles and dry details. Pleasure was forgotten, amusement was 
disregarded. He had no time to loiter by the way. He was not only 
inspired by ambition, but urged by poverty. He worked not for fame 
only, but for bread. 

At the age of twenty-two he had made sufficient progress in his 
studies to justify his admission to the bar. Immediately on obtaining 
his license, he entered upon the practice of his profession. At this 
period the "state of his finances" was low indeed. He wanted even 
the means to purchase a suit of clothes to appear in a decent garb 
-among his fellow-members at the bar. This, however, was the last 
mortification of a pecuniary kind to which he was subjected. His 
acknowledged talents, energy, and business habits, soon placed him be- 
yond the reach of want. His business rapidly increased. In a short 
time his reputation as a sound lawyer and eloquent advocate was estab- 
lished, and he had the satisfaction to find himself employed in all the 
most important cases on the circuit. 

In the western states the connection between law and politics is so in- 
timate, that it is next to impossible for a lawyer who possesses a talent 
for public speaking, to avoid participating in the exciting discussions of 
the day. 

If his own ambition does not impel him to take the lead, the impor- 
tunities of his personal and political friends will force him into a 
prominent position. Accordingly, we find Mr. Dixon, in the summer 
of 1830, called upon by his fellow-citizens of the county of Henderson, 
to represent them in the popular branch of the legislature. His course, 
during the session which he served, was marked by his usual industry 
and talent. Among other reforms which he advocated, was a bill for 
the better protection of the rights of married women, which, though un- 
successful at the time, has since been adopted in its most important 
features, and become one of the most popular laws of the state. From 
this time until 1836 he devoted himself exclusively to the practice of 
his profession, which had now become not only extensive but lucrative. 
The reward of his early toils and resolute self-denial, when both neces- 
sity and ambition impelled him to "shun delights and live laborious 
days" was in his hands. He had obtained what my Lord Bacon calls 
the "vantage ground of jurisprudence." It was not his place now to 
wait for clients, but rather for clients to wait for him. 

In 1836, Mr. Dixon was elected to represent the counties of Hender- 
son, Hopkins and Daviess, in the senate. In 1841, he was again elected 
to the legislature from the county of Henderson, without opposition. 
In 1843, he was nominated by the whig convention of Kentucky for the 
office of lieutenant-governor, on the same ticket with Mr. Ousley, and 
was not only elected over his competitor by a triumphant majority, but 
far outran the gubernatorial candidate. During the canvass, his advocacy 
of the principles and measures of the whig party was unusually able, 
particularly his defence of our domestic manufactures. The protective 
policy has never been so popular in the southern states as in the more 
densely populated districts of the North, where labor is cheap and 
capital is abundant. 

The interests of the people are not bound up in its success. ITieir 
means are not invested in manufactures but in agriculture, and it is a 



ARCHIBALD DIXON, OF KENTUCKT. '739 

task of some difficulty to convince them that a measure which apparently 
takes money out of their pockets can be just or expedient. Air. Dixon, 
nevertheless, made the features of the American system occupy the most 
important place in his discussions, and the manner in which he treated 
the subject was so able, and his arrruments so convincing, that he obtained 
the greatest applause from all quarters except the ranks of the opposi- 
tion ; and we think ourselves justifiable in saying, that he succeeded in 
establishing this most important policy upon a much more secure and 
permanent basis than it had hitherto occupied in Kentucky. During 
the next four years, he was ex-offi.cio President of the Senate, and in the 
difficult and often perplexing duties of his position he had the pleasure 
of giving universal satisfaction to both parties. Ever present at his 
post, the promptitude of his decisions was only equaled by their in- 
flexible justice. In 1848 he was preferred by a majority of the whig 
party for the office of governor, and but for the unyielding opposition 
of the friends of the opposing candidates, would have received the no- 
mination at the hands of the convention. Being satisfied that the ex- 
citement nf feeling, which existed in the two sections of the party, 
would materially impair its efficiency in the approaching gubernatorial 
and presidential contests, he did not hesitate to sacrifice his per- 
sonal ambition to the good of the whig cause; and Mr. Crittenden 
being placed in nomination, he instructed his friends to withdraw his 
name. The year 1849 was a period of great political excitement 
throughout the state, A constitutional convention was about to 
assemble for the reformation of the organic law, and many new and 
highly important questions were presented to the consideration 
of the people. Among these, not the least interesting, was a 
pro[)osition for the gradual emancipation of the slave population. 
This measure was advocated by several highly distinguished persons, 
and though there was scarcely a probability of its immediate success, 
yet the mere agitation of the question was deemed by Mr. Dixon im- 
politic and dangerous. The shock which it might give to the stability 
and security of sixty millions of property would, in his opinion, more 
than counterbalance any remote and doubtful advantage which could 
possibly accrue from the discussion of so delicate a subject. He ac- 
cordingly opposed and denounced it with all the energy and vehemence 
of his nature. Being chosen, without opposition, a member of the con- 
vention, he brought forward the following resolution, which he sustain- 
ed with marked ability, and which, in substance, was finally incorpo- 
rated into the constitution, "Whereas, the right of the citizen to be 
secure in his person and property is not only guaranteed by all free 
governments, but lies at the very foundation of them ; and, whereas, 
the powers derived to this convention, immediately and collectively, 
are distinctly from the people ; and, although not expressed, are im- 
plied, and that among them is the power so to change the existing consti- 
tution of the state as to afibrd a more ample protection to the civil 
and religious rights of the citizen, but not to destroy them ; and, where- 
as, the slaves of citizens of this commonwealth are property, both those 
that are now in esse, and those hereafter born of mothers who may be 
slaves at the time of such birth, therefore, 

" Resolved, That this Convention has not the power, or right, by any 



740 SKBTCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

principle it may incorporate into the constitution of the state, to de- 
prive the citizen of his property -without his consent, unless it be for 
the public good, and only then by making to him a just compensation 
therefor." 

As a specimen of the style of Mr. Dixon, we insert the following 
extract from the speech -which he delivered when the above resolution 
was brought up for discussion : 

" But my friend from Nelson maintains another proposition, and I 
intend to call attention to it now. ^es,it is a strange proposition, and 
that is, that all the right we have to our slave population is derived 
from the constitution and laws of the state. If the gentleman would 
but looli back to the history of the acquisition of titles to slave proper- 
ty, he would find there a refutation of his whole position. How did we 
originally acquire any title to slave property in this country 1 If he 
will look back as far as 1020, he will find that the very first slaves 
were brought to Virginia, in that year, in a Dutch vessel. If he will 
look back not quite so far, he will find that charters were granted by 
Queen Elizabeth to certain companies, empowering them to go to 
Africa and possess themselves of slaves, and bring them to the 
then colonies of North America. He will find that they were 
permitted to go, and that many went without any permission at all. 
Well ; when they went there, what did they dol They acquired the 
property ; they captured or purchased the negroes; they exercised their 
manual strength and labor in acquiring the possession of that property ; 
they became owners by occupation, or by purchase — a way of acquir- 
ing property that gentleman will readily understand. I say they be- 
came owners by occupation, as those gentlemen who have gone to 
California to dig gold. 

" There being no law to protect it, they became entitled to the gold 
from the very tact that they exercise manual labor to separate it from 
that earth in which it has been long imbedded. Law does not provide 
the right to the gold, and it does not provide the right to capture and 
appropriate the slave. They had the gold without any law, and they 
have now called a convention of gold-diggers and miners, and for what 
purpose 1 To give them title to the gold 1 Not at all ; they have that 
right now, but it is to give protection to those rights which they have 
acquired by occupancy. That is the object and design. To give them 
rights'? Not at all ; but the protection of the rights which now exist. 
Let us take this mutter a little farther. I believe that when Kentucky 
separated from Virginia, — or to go farther, that before any constitution 
was formed in the United States, the people of Virginia had their slaves, 
and that they had a right to them. And when the act of separation 
was passed on the part of Virginia allowing Kentucky to become a 
separate state — when she separated herself and threw herself back on 
first principles, and declared her sovereignty in the act of establishing 
organic law, her citizens then had this right of property in slaves. 
Those rights of property, therefore, were not derived from the laws of 
Virginia, or from the constitution of 1792 or 1799 ; they existed prior 
to, and independent of, those laws. They existed because they were 
rights clearly acquired from those who first acquired the slaves, and 
which had come down to their descendants by descent, or which had 



ARCHIBALD DIXON, OF KENTUCKT. 741 

been transferred by purchase. Thus were these rights existing prior to 
the adoption of any organic law, But at this particular period of time, 
when all things are thrown back to their original elements, and all per- 
mitted to express their opinions and views on all and every question, a 
strange proposition is springing up in the midst of our excited country- 
men. What is it 1 One says to another, you have no right to all that 
land of yours ; and another, you have no right to your negroes ; and 
another, you have no right to your strong box. It is a strange proposi- 
tion springing up right here in this community. What will be the re- 
sult of it? 

" j\Ir. C. A. WicLiFFE. — Does the gentleman mean to say that I ad- 
vocate such a doctrine on this floor? If so, he is mistaken." 

" Mr. Dixox. — I mean that such is the etTect of the gentleman's pro- 
position. 1 say that it is the true consequence of the doctrine advanced, 
that all power belongs to this convention, and that no right exists 
independent of the organic law it may make, or the statute laws which 
may be passed under it. I say, then, let us go back to the state of 
society I have mentioned to the gentleman. Let the proposition be 
made and proclaimed to the people of Kentucky, that prior to the 
adoption of their constitution the right to property does not exist, and 
what would be the condition of every member of -society ? The very 
assumption of the principle would be looked upon as a violation of 
every principle of right which lies at the foundation of every free gov- 
ernment. 

" Well, our title to our slaves is not derived from Virginia, or from 
the constitution or statute laws of Kentucky, but it is derived in the 
manner which I have represented. We come, then, to the formation of 
our present constitution. What shall we do here? We intend to 
miite in framing a constitution that will protect, not destroy ; to build 
up, and not to pull down ; to throw the a^gis of our protection around 
the rights of the citizen, and not to put in the hands of the incendiary a 
torch to consume or a sword to destroy and murder. This convention 
has no such power. And if such a power can exist, if it is to be pro- 
claimed here that fifty-one men in this convention have the right to seize 
on the property, should they see proper to do it, then away with the 
rights of the people. If this is not radicalism, the rank old agrarianism, 
starting up here as from the floors of the old Roman senate, shaking its 
gory locks at us, it is very like it. I will say to it, " thou canst not 
say I did it ;" but I will say, also, it is you. and you, who proclaim such 
doctrines, who did it. And where is this thing to stop ? Who can tell 
what a people may do hereafter, and what a majority may fovor here- 
after — where is it to stop ? I said the other day, when it is once admit- 
ted that a mere majority has the right and the power to seize upon the 
property of the people and to appropriate it to such use as they may 
think proper, there is no longer any safety in society. You have but to 
proclaim to all the vagabond population of the world that they have 
only to become citizens of Kentucky, and a majority, in order to seize 
upon the property of our citizens and appropriate it as they think 
proper; you have but to call upon the wild spirits that inhabit the free 
states and the great cities, the skulking vagabond population who only 
seek an opportunity for plunder and murder; you have but to call 



Y42 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

upon those people of other countries who have been expatriated from, 
tlieir own lands by the laws, and who are driven from necessityto 
violence and outrage on those who are better off; you have but to call 
upon these classes to come to Kentucky, and to assert the rights of a 
citizen, and obtain the privilege of voting, and what would be the re- 
sult 1 They would pour in upon us as did the Goth and Vandal barba- 
rians upon the Roman territory ; they would come as did the Huns 
under the lead of Atilla, sweeping before them, as with a whirlwind of 
desolation, all the great institutions of the country, and monopolizing 
all is property. They would rally around some great leader, like that 
" scourge of nations" and destroyer of civil institutions, who looked 
back on the desolation he had left and forward on the beauty that was 
spread before him, and like that conquerer exclaim — "I look ahead, and 
all is beautiful, and all is cheering to my eyes and hopes. I look be- 
hind, and my track is marked in ashes and in blood. Desolation spreads 
itself in my rear, and the beauties of civilization wither and fade at my 
approach." And your beautiful land of Kentucky — this fair garden of 
tile United States — this spot where the poet delights to dwell, and the 
statesman and hero delight to linger — this great Kentucky of ours, so 
glorious in the memory of the past, and so bright in the vista of the future 
— it is to become like the plains of Italy ; it is to be scourged by those 
who come, like the Goths and Vandals, and Huns under Atilla, scatter- 
ine: ruin and waste through our land. 1 never will subscribe to such a 
doctrine, or agree that fifty-one men shall be armed with the sovereign 
power of seizing on my life, liberty, or property, and appropriating it 
to their own use, in violation of the great principle which lies at the 
foundation of all free governments." 

The firm and resolute course pursued by Mr. Dixon on the slave 
question, as niay naturally be supposed, had no tendency to increase 
his popularity with the emancipationists. Having received the nomi- 
nation for governor in 1S51, their influence and suffrages, with but few 
exceptions, were withheld from him, and as an immense majority of 
them were whigs, his election was thereby defeated. His vote, how- 
ever, was larger than that of any other whig candidate who had pre- 
viously aspired to the office. The emancipation candidate, Mr. Cassius 
M. Clay, run both as a whig and an emancipationist. 

Some time before the nomination was conferred upon Mr. Dixon, he 
became satisfied that his election was impossible, and addressed a letter 
to his fellow-citizens of Kentucky, withdrawing his name from all con- " 
nection with the office, assigning his reasons for the course which he 
pursued, and calling on the convention to select some other standard- 
bearer, who would be able to unite both the emancipationists and the 
old whigs. But against his own better judgment, and in opposition to 
his remonstrances, his friends in the convention, who constituted a 
large majority, determined upon his nomination. With the conscious- 
ness that he was leading a forlorn hope ; nay, that it was almost abso- 
lutely impossible that he should be elected, his ardor was not damped, 
"nor his natural force abated." He was still found in the fore front of 
battle striking bold strokes himself, and urging on his party to the con- 
test. It was a period not only of great interest in the domestic politics 
of Kentucky, but of intense political excitement throughout the coun- 



ARCHIBALD DIXON, OF KENTUCKY. 743 

try. Two great parties at the Noith and the South were set against 
each other in hostile array. "The imprisoned winds weie let loose. 
The East, the North, and the stornnj South, combined to throw the 
whole ocean into commotion, to toss its billows to the skies, and dis- 
close its profoundest depths." It is hardly necessary to say that Mr. 
Dixon was not found among the number of tho'se who lent their influ- 
ence to add to the fury of the storm. Everywhere throughout the 
whole state his voice was heard, trumpet-toned, in the defence of the 
Union, and deprecating, as the most terrible of calamities, its dissolu- 
tion and destruction. While those giants of intellect, Mr. Webster 
and Mr. Clay, were defending it at the capital, their hands were upheld, 
and the position which they occupied made secure, by the able and 
patriotic efforts of such men as Mr. Dixon among the people. From 
every speakers stand in Kentucky, his eloquent voice was heard calling 
upon the people to stand by the institutions of their fathers, and main- 
tain the integrity of the Union against the insidious attacks of northern 
abolitionists and the more violent and furious onslaughts of southern 
seceders. Those spirit-stirring appeals were not lost. They were not 
thrown away upon listless ears. The people of Kentucky, we assert 
boldly, have more true loyalty of feeling, and deep, unselfish, patriotic 
affection and admiration for the Republic than those of any other state. 
These patriotic sentiments Mr, Dixon, by his bold and manly elo- 
quence, awakened into activity at a time when the expression of such 
sentiments on the part of the masses was necessary to sustain the 
course of those great statesmen who stood like faithful pilots at the 
helm, and finally succeeded in weathering the storm. lie spoke not 
for his own election merely, nor for the success of the whig party, but 
fcir the Union. 

The gubernatorial campaign, as he had anticipated and predicted, 
resulted in his defeat by a small majority. But the emancipation party, 
though it possessed a sufficient number of votes to control the election, 
before the people, on account of the almost equal division of the state 
between the whigs and democrats, did not possess the same command- 
ing power in the legislature, and the immense majority who coincided 
with Mr. Dixon in his opinions on the subject of slavery, determined to 
reward his talents and fidelitv with a seat in the United States Senate. 
He was opposed, however, by the whole emancipation influence in the 
contest which ensued for this high office, and was run against nearly 
every prominent whig in the state, Mr. Crittenden included. A caucus 
having at last been called for the purpose of deciding the claims of the 
respective candidates, it was found that Mr. Crittenden and Mr. Dixon 
were the only competitors. The friends of Mr. Dixon claimed a ma- 
jority of two, but the adherents of Mr. Crittenden remaining firm or 
obstinate, as the apologists of either side may prefer, Mr. Dixon con- 
sented, for the sake of harmony in the whig party, that his own name 
should be withdrawn in connection with the withdrawal of that of Mr. 
Crittenden. It being anticipated, however, that a vacancy in the senate 
might soon occur, the friends of Mr. Dixon still adhered to him, re- 
solved upon his ultimate success, and in a short time the resignation of 
Mr. Clay again called upon the legislature of Kentucky to choose a re- 
presentative to fill the unexpired term of that great man. The name 



V44 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

of Mr. Dixon was immediately presented to the two houses of the legis- 
lative body for their suffrages, and in opposition to it those of many- 
other prominent and distinguished whigs, but after a few ballotings his 
election was carried without difficulty. He will take his seat in that 
illustrious body which has been so long adorned by the most brilliant 
talents of the nation, on the first Monday in December, 1852. 

The person of Mr. Dixon is tall and slender, but erect and com- 
manding. His features are regular, and their combined expression 
stern but vivacious. The style of his oratory is bold, vigorous and 
highly impassioned. In his conduct at the bar he employs his whole 
mind and soul, every thought, feeling, and sentiment, in his cause. 
During the progress of the trial, the court, the jury, and the witnesses, 
constitute the whole world to him. All beyond that little circle, which 
is hemmed in by the iron rails of the bar, is forgotten ; but not the 
slightest circumstance which occurs within that circle is disregarded. 
These qualities, so invaluable in a lawyer, could not have failed to se- 
cure him the most abundant success in his profession. From the out- 
set of his career he has steadily advanced in fortune and reputation. 

As a criminal lawyer, his success has been unusual, and almost un- 
precedented. If he is more at home in any one branch of his profession 
than another, it is in this. His peculiar style of oratory is perhaps bet- 
ter suited to it. In the solemnity of such an occasion, when the life of 
a human being hangs upon the opinion of a jury of twelve men, when 
the audience is silent from the intense interest which is always excited 
by the importance of ^the proceedings, it is then that his talent, as a 
forensic speaicer, displays itself in its full force and brilliancy. If you 
were not certain that he is the master of his subject you might suppose 
that his subject was the master of him, so completely does he appear 
to be absorbed in the cause of his client. His voice rises to the highest 
pitch, or descends to the deepest tones of solemnity. His eye flashes 
with enthusiasm, the muscles of his face work with the energy of his 
feelings, and the violence of his gesticulation convinces that the whole 
soul of the orator is awakened and aroused. Nor does his spirit flag, 
or the vigor of his declamation abate, until he has thoroughly weighed 
and investigated every point in his cause, and awakened every senti- 
ment of humanity that may exist in the bosoms of the jury. His mas- 
terly conduct of this class of cases has become so well known and uni- 
versally acknowledged, that his services are almost invariably secured 
when it is possible for him to be present at the trial. 

In politics, Mr. Dixon is a decided whig, and has ever supported the 
principles of the whig party with undeviating consistency. An ardent 
admirer and devoted friend of Mr. Clay, he has steadily advocated the 
national policy of that illustrious statesman, and yielded him his warm- 
est support. In heart and soul an advocate for the union of the states, 
the late brilliant efforts of the " Great Pacificator" were contemplated 
by him with satisfaction and delight. He is for the compromise as it 
stands, without the slightest abatement or reservation, as a final settle- 
ment of those alarming questions which have so long agitated the 
country. He has at all times supported by his voice and by his influ- 
ence, a judicious system of public schools ; a subject on which too little 
attention has been hitherto bestowed in Kentucky. Having been poor 



ARCHIBALD DIXON, OF KENTUCKY. 745 

himself, and risen by his own unaided efforts from the ranks, Mr. Dixon 
knows well how to sympathize with the feelings and wants of this large 
class of his fellow-citizens, and he has always found them his firmest 
and most reliable adherents in the various contests through which he 
has passed. On his part, at every period of his life, he has given his 
faithful and energetic support to those measures which were calculated 
to advance their interests and elevate their condition. On the various 
political questions which have occupied the attention of the country for 
the last quarter of a century, he has expressed himself with freedom 
and boldness, but it must be confessed that he has not at all times pro- 
fited by his candor. As a man and citizen, his character is above re- 
proach. Devotedly beloved by his friends, his unsullied honor and 
unbending integrity have obtained for him the respect of all. He is 
now fifty years old. His course of life, from the commencement of 
his professional career, has been in the main prosperous, and we may 
be permitted to express the hope and expectation that he will gather 
fresh laurels in his new field of exertion. 

[Mr. Dixon is now in the U. S. Senate, having been elected to fill 
the vacancy occasioned by the resignation of the late Henry Clay.] 




■^i:--ir- _A_H."B.i'^ 




TOjiZfEns/r JVX'C-E ^,r nyn ."'.'^tb' Ti(i:""S-n:-' "IR''- 



747 



HON. LOTT WARREN, 

JUDGE OF THE SCPERIOR COURTS OF THE SOUTHWESTERN DISTRICT, OEOKGIA, 

Examples that impress force of character on all who study them, are 
worthy of record. By a few general observations we might convey 
some idea of the Hon. Lott Warren as a jurist; but, as he unites in 
his compositioa so many elements of a solid and practical nature, which 
raised him from obscurity to his present elevation, we shall indulge 
somewhat freely in particulars, in order to excite sympathy with his 
fortunes, and to encourage youth. 

His ancestors came from England, and settled in Virginia, from 
whence his father, Josiah Warren, removed to North Carolina during 
the Revolutionary war, and married Nancy Doty, in the county of 
Onslow. After the birth of two children, his parents settled in Burke 
countv, Georgia, where Lott, the eleventh child, was born on the 30th 
day of October, 1797. Erom Burke they removed, in 1804, to a place 
four miles below Dublin, on the Oconee River, in Laurens county. 

In his eighth year the subject of this memoir went to his first school, 
with six brothers and sisters, who walked daily upwards of three miles, 
to obtain what knowledge Mr. Matthew Burns, an Englishman, could 
impart during his sober intervals. The school lasted nine months ; but, 
at the end of two quarters, Mr. Warren withdrew his children, owing to 
the intemperate habits of the teacher. Being a pious member of the 
Baptist Church, and a magistrate, Mr. Warren had a peculiar dislike to 
drunkards; and, from his condemnation of that vice, his son, of whom 
it is our privilege to speak, no doubt imbibed that antipathy to alcoholic 
drinks which has since marked his career. Residing in a wilderness 
frontier, distant from other settlements, Mr. Warren was frequently 
called upon, as a justice of the peace, to unite persons in wedlock at his 
own house. On such occasions the visiting party brought their own 
wine or brandy, as the case might be, and used it among themselves ; 
no member of the household participating. 

Li February, 1809, Mr. Warren and his wife both died. It is due to 
the memory of this excellent man to say, that he was an humble and 
zealous Christian, and a faithful magistrate. His very name was a. 
terror to evil doers. He committed the guardianship of his sons Lott 
and Eli, (the latter now General Warren, of Houston county.) to the 
Rev. Charles Culpepper, who had married his eldest daughter. Mr. 
Culpepper was a minister of the Baptist Church, and brother of.the Hon. 
John Culpepper, formerly a representative in Congress from North 
Carolina. After the season for working the crop was over, Lott 
passed a few weeks at school, under Mr. Joseph Culpepper, in 1809. 
His guardian removed to Wilkinson county in 1812, then a rough 
frontier settlement, and was sent to school to Mr. Elkanah Powell, 
(who was afterwards killed in Twiggs county, by a man named 
Summers.) During the six months under Mr. Powell's tuition, our 
pupil learned to write, and made some progress in arithmetic. His 



748 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

next teacher was Mr. James Fitzgerald, (now a venerable citizen of 
Houston county.) and, after the usual labor on the farm, he again went 
to Mr. Powell's school. While there an incident occurred, which, as it 
had a controlling influence on the mind of young Warren, is worthy of 
special notice. 

A man was charged with forging a note on Gov. Irwin, and his trial 
came on in Wilkinson Superior Court, before the Hon. Stephen W. 
Harris, Judge. The prosecution was sustained by Colonel Abedncgo 
Franklin, Solicitor-General, assisted by Colonel Moses Fort. The 
prisoner was defended by Colonel Seaborn Jones, now of Columbus. 
Gov. Irwin was sworn and examined as a witness. His praise was in 
all the land. By leave of his teacher, young Warren was present as a 
spectator, the first privilege he had ever enjoyed of witnessing a 
trial in court. Standing barefoot, a coarse, ungainly lad of fifteen, clad 
in homespun, with wool hat in band, gazing with intense curiosity, from 
a window, on the scene before him, all silence to hear the Governor 
deliver his testimony, what was his astonishment to hear Colonel Jones 
cross-examine the witness with as much boldness and rigor as if he had 
been only a common man! Speeches of counsel and the charge of 
the court followed ; the whole proceeding filled him with an irresistible 
desire to be a lawyer. On his return home at night, he mentioned the 
subject to his sister, who expressed surprise and sorrow, raising two 
principal objections : first, that he had not the means, (his patrimony 
being less than 8500,) to prepare for the bar, and in the next place 
she did not consider lawyers sufficiently moral. He replied that he 
must have an English education in some way, and as to any supposed 
vices prevalent amongst lawyers, he would endeavor to be an exception. 
His sister was nothing convinced, and disposed of his request without 
even consulting his guardian. She lived to see him, in less than twenty 
years afterwards. Judge of the Southern Circuit. 

In the spring of 181G, young Warren entered as a clerk in the store 
of Amos Love, a pious Baptist, to whom Mr. Culpepper ministered in 
Dublin. Owing to bad health, he left Dublin in the fall, and became 
clerk to S. & R. W^orrel, in Irwintou, near his sister, and shortly re- 
turned to Mr. Love. Within a few weeks he was drafted into the 
militia service for the Seminole war; and in February, 1818, was 
elected Second Lieutenant of the Laurens Company, commanded by 
Capt. Elijah Dean. 

This was his first promotion ; and highly gratified, no doubt, was he 
with his martial honors on the eve of an expedition. Not for the 
purpose of showing any military talent or conspicuous deed in arms, to 
entitle Lieutenant Warren to public admiration, do we attempt a brief 
sketch of the campaign in which he served; but to preserve a few 
incidents, of which he is, perhaps, the best if not the only living witness, 
in relation to the burning of the Indian town of Chehaw, near the pre- 
sent site of Starkville, Lee county. It was the burning of this town 
that led to an animated correspondence* between Gen. Andrew Jackson 
and Gov. Rabun. 



Seo White's Statistics of Gcor-ria, 488-'93. 



LOTT WARREN, OF GEORGIA. 749 

After General Gaines retired from Amelia Island, he took command 
of the state troops which had been ordered out by the Governor, and 
among them a company of Chatham militia, together with the Laurens 
and ^Viilvinson Companies. They were ordered to the Big Bend of the 
Ocmulgec Kiver, below Hartford, under the command of Major Clinton 
Wright, of the U. S. Army, to discover the course of the Indians, who 
had been committing murders and robberies on that frontier. After 
organizing the guard, Major Wright, pointing his sword towards him, 
said, '■ Lieut. Warren, I shall look to you for the discharge of the duties 
of Adjutant of this detachment. Come to my fire as soon as possible." 
The young subaltern went accordingly, and in vain alleged his ignor- 
ance of duty as a reason why he should be excused from the task. But 
the reply was, "You have nothing to do except to obey orders." Thus 
forced into the position, Lieut. Warren performed its labor actively, 
much to his own improvement, and to the satisfaction of a meritorious 
officer, who was drowned soon afterwards in attempting to cross Flint 
River on a raft. 

From Big Bend, by way of Hartford, the command marched on 
the Blackshear road to Fort Early, where it crossed Flint Iviver in the 
night, and proceeded to destroy the Hoponee and Philemi towns, fif- 
teen or twenty miles west of the river. Evidence had been collect- 
ed implicating these towns in the atrocities on the frontier. Arrived 
withiii a few miles of the Chehaw town, which was supposed to be 
Philemi, a council of war was called, and it was determined to send 
forty of the best mounted men to reconnoitre. They discovered 
large herds of cattle that had been stolen from the whites on tlie Oc- 
mulgee, and an Indian minding them. Captain Obed Wright, of the 
Chatham militia, who had volunteered his services, had positive orders 
from the Governor to destroy the Hoponee and Philemi towns, which 
were known to be hostile. Captain Wright then formed the command 
into column, and gave express orders that the women and children 
should not be hurt, and that a white flag should be respected. Within 
half a mile of the main town a gate was opened by an aged warrior, 
and the troops passed in. Every thing was quiet. The children 
swunfT in their hammocks, and the women were beating meal. The 
cavalry in front.fired several pistols to the left, killing the warrior who 
opened the gate. Capt. Dean ordered a charge, but Capt. Wright coun- 
termanded the order. Two Indians were seen loading their guns. About 
this time, Howard, a friendly chief, was killed, while holding up a white 
fla"-. The men dashed off" in pursuit of the Indians, who fled in every 
direction. Lieut. Warren was ordered, with eighteen men, to burn 
the cabins. First removing whatever was valuable, two or three cabins 
onlv were burnt. The command then returned to Fort Early that 
night, sold the plunder next day, and divided the spoil. Lieut. Warren 
refused his portion. 

It was the opinion of all concerned at the time, that it was Philemi 
town which had been destroyed. The chief Howard, and two other 
Indians who placed themselves in the power of the troops, were mur- 
dered in cold blood. But the error had been committed rashly, under 
excitement, and could not be repaired. The companies were soon dis- 



750 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

charged, and returned home. Lieut. Warren resumed his situation in 
Mr. Love's store. 

In a few days, Major Davis, of the U. S. Army, called on Lieut. 
Warren in Dublin, and stated that he had orders from Gen. Jackson 
to arrest Capt. Wright. Lieut. Warren accompanied him to the hotel, 
"where he introduced him to Capt. Wright, who at once submitted. It 
may as well be remarked here that Capt. Wright had not been mus- 
tered into the service of the United States, and was, of course, not 
subject to the orders of Gen. Jackson. His arrest, by the authority 
of the latter, was therefore regarded by Gov. Rabun and the justices 
of the Inferior Court of Baldwin county, as a usurpation of power. 
After the discharge of Capt. Wright, upon Habeas Corpus, at Milledge- 
ville, the Governor had him immediately arrested for disobeying 
orders, in not destroying the Hoponee and Philemi towns, as well as 
Chehaw, but, being at liberty on his parole of honor, Capt. Wright 
escaped. 

We close this part of the memoir by a few extracts from the corres- 
pondence between Gen, Jackson and Gov. Rabun, as relevant. Refer- 
ring to the outrage on the Chehaw village, Gen. Jackson in his letter 
of May 7, 1818, says: 

"Such base cowardice and murderous conduct as this transaction 
affords, has no parallel in history, and shall meet with its merited 
punishment. You, sir, as Governor of a State within my military 
division, have no right to give a military order while I am in the field ; 
and this being an open and violent infringement of the treaty with the 
Creek Indians, Capt, Wright must be prosecuted and punished for this 
outrageous murder, and 1 have ordered him to be arrested and confined 
in irons, until the pleasure of the President of the United States is 
known upon the subject. If he has left Hartford before my orders 
reach him, I call upon you, as Governor of Georgia, to aid me in car- 
rying into effect my order for his arrest and confinement, which I trust 
will be afforded, and Captain Wright brought to condign punishment for 
this unparalleled murder." 

In his reply of June 1st, after referring to the communication of Gen. 
Glascock, on which Gen. Jackson based his censure, Gov. Rabun says : 

" Had you, sir, or General Glascock, been in possession of the facts 
that produced this affair, it is to be presumed, at least, that you would 
not have indulged in a strain so indecorous and unbecoming. I had, on 
the 21st March last, stated the situation of our bleeding frontier to you, 
and requested you, in respectful terms, to detail a part of your over- 
whelming force for our protection, or that you would furnish supplies, 
and I would order out more troops, to which you have never yet 
deigned to reply. You state, in a very haughty tone, that I, a Governor 
of a State under your military division, have no right to give a military 
order whilst you were in the field. Wretched and contemptible indeed 
must be our situation if this be the fact. When the liberties of the 
people of Georgia shall have been prostrated at the feet of a military 
despotism, then, and not till then, will your imperious doctrine be 
tamely submitted to. You may rest assured that if the savages con- 
tinue their depredations on our unprotected frontier, I shall think and 
act for myself in that respect." 



L 



LOTT WARREN, OF GEORGIA. VSl 

We have introduced these pungent passages, not only as a part of 
history, but to prepare the way to a graceful scene in Congress, twenty- 
four years afterward, between Ex-President Adams and Judge Warren, 
which we shall describe at the proper time. 

Not having relinquished his design of becoming a member of the 
legal profession, Mr. Warren applied himself six months to a grammar 
school, in 1819, kept by Doctor William A. Hill, at the residence of 
General David Blackshear. Soon thereafter he was employed as su- 
percargo, or agent, on a flatboat, to keep the accounts of the commis- 
sioners of the Oconee River, to buy provisions for the hands at work 
in cleaning out the river, and to disburse money set apart for this and 
other purposes connected with the inland navigation of Georgia. Hav- 
ing frequent intervals of leisure, he read Blackstone's Commentaries 
through while on the river, and before retiring from his situation, in 
February, 1820. Pie then entered the law-office of Daniel M'Neel, 
Esq., in Dublin, and diligently applied himself to legal studies, not, 
however, with such entire devotion as to exclude matrimony from his 
thoughts. An attachment formed at school was crowned, October 
19tli, 1820, by his marriage with Miss Jane Desaubleaux, orphan of a 
French gentleman who came to the United States during the Revolu- 
tionary War, and who constituted General Blackshear the testamentary 
guardian of his daughters. The patrimony of his bride for a long 
time was unproductii'e, but at length became valuable from the charac- 
ter of the property. Her guardian was distinguished for wisdom and 
integrity. At the mention of his name, the writer, who knew him well, 
cannot avoid paying a tribute to his memory, which his long and faith- 
ful public services more than justify. 

General Blackshear was a member of the Legislature of Georgia, in 
179G, and co-operated with General James Jackson in the repeal of the 
infamous Yazoo Act of the previous session. In 1801, he was a Presi- 
dential Elector, and voted for Mr. Jefferson — an honor which was be- 
stowed on him at each Presidential election, until his death, July 4, 
1837. For about twenty years he was a Senator from Laurens county ; 
and, owing to his vigilance in protecting that instrument from abuse, 
he was called the " Old Constitution." In strong common sense in the 
practical affairs of life, in the style of his conversation, and even in 
physiognomy, he resembled Dr. Franklin. 

At March term, 1821, of Laurens Superior Court, Mr. Warren was 
admitted to the bar. He immediately opened an office in Dublin, and 
attended several of the courts in the southern and middle circuits, with 
a fair prospect of business. 

In 1823, he was elected a major of battalion in the militia, and in 
1824 a representative in the legislature from Laurens county. With 
a view to improve his situation he removed to the village of Marion, 
Twiggs county, in February, 1825. A vacancy occurring in the office 
of Solicitor-General, by the death of Thomas D. Mitchell, Esq., (in a 
duel,) in March, 1826, Major Warren was appointed by Gov. Troup to 
execute that office until the meeting of the legislature, when he was 
elected, and served out the term, until November, 1828. He declined 
being a candidate for re-election. 

While in office, it became his duty to prosecute several Indians in 



752 SKETCHES OF EMINEKT AMERICANS. 

Thomas county, for murder. The evidence established their guilt, and 
they were convicted. On motion of the Solicitor-General, the prisoners 
were brought up for sentence. Judge F. gave them a talk, which was 
translated to the Indians, informing them that they must soon die with 
a rope round their neclvs, for killing a white person. Then appointing 
the time for their execution, the Judge gravely remarked, that it was 
unnecessary to invoke the usual blessing on the prisoners, as they did 
not understand the English ! The same Judge once severely lectured 
a Justice of the Peace, who had been convicted of assault and battery, 
telling him how disagreeable it was to the court to inflict the punish- 
ment which his example made necessary ; and after visions of the pen- 
itentiary and of a ruinous fine had caused paleness and trembling in the 
poor magistrate, the Judge read his sentence as follows : " Whereupon 
it is ordered by the Court, that the defendant pay a fine of one dollar, 
and costs of prosecution, and be thence discharged." Mental distress 
was never more suddenly relieved. 

About the time he retired from the office of Solicitor-General, the 
intellect and energy of Major Warren began to attract public observa- 
tion. He was employed in almost every litigated case on the circuit. 
No one excelled him in zeal, and but few in strength, among his asso- 
ciates at the bar. He frequently came in collision with Shorter, Prince, 
Rockwell, Torrance, Strong, and other advocates of established reputa- 
tion, and always sustained himself in argument. Mr. Warren was 
never eloquent, if flowery language, a cultivated voice, and classic ges- 
tures be indispensable to eloquence; but he was at all times interest- 
inrr^ — a close reasoner, with authorities well applied ; and what was 
better still, he exhibited a degree of self-possession and common-sense 
which often secured him victory in the jury-box over a competitor far 
more astute and pretending. 

The people of Twiggs county elected him to the state senate in 1 830. 
Mr. Warren had always been a warm supporter of Governor Troup, and 
was a member of the State Rights' Party when a high Tariff" for pro- 
tection created a pregnant issue in the South. In his senatorial career 
of only one session, he was active in the preparation and advocacy of 
measures which he deemed for the public good. He exerted consider- 
able influence in debate, and returned to his constituents with praise. 
The organization of the Cherokee Territory, which led to the impri- 
sonment of the Missionaries, and the fruitless mandate of the Supreme 
Court to enjoin the execution of the Indian Tassels, was the leading 
topic of the session, and received the cordial support of the Senator 
from Twiggs. 

In November, 1831, Mr. Warren was elected by the legislature, 
Judge of the Superior Courts of the Southern District, for a term 
of three years. Although his manner of presiding was not altogether 
as affable and patient as some members of the bar desired, his decisions 
were in general satisfactory, from the sound reasoning on which they 
were based. Occasionally, when a question was raised, he embarrassed 
counsel by an intimation of his mind, yet seldom declined hearing the 
argument in full. It was evident, however, from his countenance, 
which he rarely attempted to control for effect, that his opinion had been 
formed, and that it was a useless consumption of time to combat it. In 



LOTT "WARREN, OF GEORGIA. 1 53 

such emergencies, if counsel, gathering courage and fresh ideas from 
the necessity of the case, could succeed in impressing the Judge that his 
hasty conclusion was adverse to recognized antiiorities, a very patient 
hearing was accorded ; and if he was really convinced of error, he 
always had the frankness to correct it in proper time. It has happened, 
that older members of the bar, entertaining a very liberal estimate of 
their own qualifications, and no extraordinary respect for those of the 
Judge, owing, no doubt, to his want of polish and urbanity, — have ven- 
tured to argue a point, contrary to rule, after the court had pronounced 
its decision. To such experiments, he promptly gave a quietus by re- 
minding counsel that the protection which the Rules of Court afforded 
the Bench, after a question had been decided, was not altogether nomi- 
nal in his court. On a few occasions, when even this hint was unavail- 
ing, and the attempt to argue was further persisted in, he has been 
known to order counsel to their seats. 

Judge Warren never pretends to forget the obscurity and adversi- 
ties of his youth ; and while he manifests a due respect for the rights 
and feelings of others, he has never permitted any infringement of his 
own to escape rebuke. Soon after he settled in Marion, a gentleman, 
who felt himself aggrieved by the testimony of Mr. Warren before a 
committee of the House of Representatives, made a very conspicuous 
and disrespectful allusion to him, in his absence, at a public dinner. As 
soon as he was informed of it, Mr. Warren dispatched a note by a gal- 
lant friend, opening the way to explanation, or, that foiling, to another 
resort usual among gentleman who recognized the code of honor. Mu- 
tual friends interposed, and the affair was honorably adjusted. We 
mention this circumstance merely to show that Judge W^arren has warm 
passions. His temperament is essentially sanguine. For the last 
twenty years, however, he has been a pious member of the Baptist 
Church, and has kept his constitutional ardor more in subjection. 

At the expirationof his judicial term, in 1834, without having placed 
himself in the power of a legislative majority opposed to him in poli- 
tics. Judge Warren resumed the practice of the law. In January, 
1836, he removed from Marion to Americus, and in 1838 was elected 
a representative in Congress, under the general ticket system. In 
4840, the same trust was renewed by the people. On his motion, 
the one-hour rule was adopted. He had seen such unnecessary waste 
of time for the sake of notoriety in discussion, and for selfish purposes 
on the part of members of Congress, that he resolved to correct the evil. 
Guided by a strong will of his own, against the persuasion of many 
friends, he moved in the matter, and the one-hour rule was incorporated 
into the forms of the House. Though much complained of by long- 
winded talkers, the rule continues still unrepealed, and will remain a 
proof of the sagacity and nerve of the mover. 

The writer has before him no record of the congressional services 
of Judge Warren. In March, 1840, he delivered a speech in the 
House of Representatives, on the " Bill additional to the Act on the 
subject of Treasury Notes," from which we give an extract. Com 
menting on the remark in President Van Buren's Message, that, " In a 
country so commercial as ours, banks, in some form, will probably 
always exist j but this serves only to render it the more incumbent op 

48 



754 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

US, notwithstanding the discouragements of the past, to strive in our 
respective stations to mitigate the evils they produce." Judge Warren 
said : 

"This is the talk of this ^ State-rights President,'' lecturing us on 
banks. "Well, sir, what have we to do with banks 1 They are created 
by the legislatures of the different States. These legislatures have the 
right to grant or withhold charters without the permission of Mr. 
Van Buren. And, sir, they afford the only currency to which the peo- 
ple can have access. Why destroy the people's currency 1 It is to 
make the currency of the office-holders worth more. Again, sir, his 
partisans in the United States Senate have created a man of straw ; and, 
in their Quixotic warfare against this creation of their own imagination, 
senators sharply reprove the States for having borrowed money, and 
built railroads, canals. &c. And now, sir, what is the pretext for 
this warfare against the States? Resolutions are introduced into 
the Senate, declaring it unconstitutional for this government to assume 
the payment of the State debts. These resolutions were met by the 
declaration, that no such thing had been asked for by the States. The 
administration partisans then say, in argument, that the distribution 
of the proceeds of the sales of the public lands and surplus reve- 
nue among the States, is an assumption of the debts of the States. 
And thus, sir, a censorious lecture is read to the sovereign States of this 
Union. If I were a member of a State legislature, I should probably 
oppose the creation of a large public debt for any purpose; but 1 
should pursue such a course as the interest of the State in my judg- 
ment required, and should not think the State subject to such lectures. 
We should remember, sir, we are but a part of a government which 
-was created, and now exists, by the will of the States. This govern- 
ment should treat the State governments as venerated parents, and not 
as disobedient children, or insubordinate servants. The President has 
set the example, and his friends, his party, have followed in his footsteps." 

Having previously referred to a scene in the House of Representa- 
tives, between Mr. Adams and Judge Warren, we shall state the par- 
ticulars. 

At the session of 1841-2, while the debate was progressing on the 
motion to strike out of the appropriation bill the salary and outfit of.^ 
our ^Minister to Mexico, Mr. Adams expressed himself to this effect: 
That Congress had no power over the question of slavery in the states 
in time of peace ; but if a servile war occurred, and the military force 
of the government had to be called out for its suppression, that mo- 
ment the whole subject came within the grasp of the government ; and 
the commander-in-chief, by declaring martial law, would suspend the 
civil authorities, and by an official edict, might give freedom to the slaves 
of the South. At this stage of his argument, Mr. Adams referred to 
the course of General Jackson during the Indian war of 1818, when he 
notified the Governor of Georgia that martial law was proclaimed 
in his State, and that the civil should be subordinate to the military 
power. Mr. Adams eulogized, in very high terms, this act of General 
Jackson, and said that the Governor of Georgia was right in yielding 
to the claim. 

As to the abstraction put forth by Mr. Adams, founded on any prin- 



LOTT WARREN, OF GEORGIA. 'IBS 

ciple of public law, Judge Warren did not feel himself called upon td 
reply ; but when the State of Georgia, through an alleged submission of 
her executive to a high-handed military behest, was held up to the world 
as having recognized a doctrine alike wild in theory and destructive in 
its application, he courteously interrupted Mr. Adams in his speech. 
Having been personally familiar with the facts, Judge Warren disabused 
the distinguished member from Massachusetts in the version he had 
given of the affair between General Jackson and Governor Rabun, by- 
stating, that the claim of authority advanced by the former, was 
promptly and successfully resisted by the latter. 

This little episode in discussion was marked with proper civilities on 
both sides. What scope for reflection, and for eulogy on our political 
system, is afforded by this solitary incident! At the time Judge 
Warren was born, Mr. Adams was a Minister Plenipotentiary, ap- 
pointed by t'residcnt Washington. In 1818, he was Secretary of State, 
and his fame in letters and diplomacy extended over the civilized 
world, when the obscure merchant's clerk, — the humble lieutenant of a 
militia company, was executing orders for the destruction of the iden- 
tical Indian town which caused General Jackson to assert the power 
sanctioned in debate by this eminent personage. Let the imagination 
rest on the floor of Congress in 1842, where, near the venerable figure 
of the Ex-President, sat this same lieutenant ! The one M'as born in 
high condition ; and after more than half a century of public honors, 
he met the humble subaltern of the Chehaw expedition on terms of 
perfect equality as a representative of the people ; that subaltern recti- 
fying the historical error of John Quincy Adams ! The subject is 
worthy of a painter for its moral sublimity. 

We must draw this memoir to a close. While absent in Congress, 
Judge Warren was ably represented at the bar by his partner in the 
practice, William H. Crawford, Esq., son of the former distinguished 
Secretary of the Treasury — Georgia's candidate for President in 1824. 
From Americus he removed to his farm in Lee county, and from thence 
to the town of Albany, in Baker county, where he now resides. In 
1843 he was elected Judge of the Superior Courts of the South- West- 
ern District, and re-elected in 1847 for a term which will expire in 
December, 1852. 

In looking through the Reports, commencing in 1846, we find that 
ninety-eight cases have been taken from Judge Warren's Circuit to the 
Supreme Court, of which forty-five have been affirmed, and fift:y-three 
reversed on writs of error. This tribunal has done much to improve 
the administration of law in Georgia. When Judge Warren first came 
to the Bench, in 1831, every Circuit was a sort of judicial republic to 
itself, without any common regulator, though there was a convention 
of Judges which met annually to form Rules of Practice, and to which 
questions in the Circuit were often referred. The convention having no 
power to decide authoritatively, advised the Circuit Judge, who, though 
at liberty to adhere to his own decisions, generally adopted the voice 
of the convention. During his term, from 1831 to 1834, the associates 
of Judge Warren in this body were Crawford, Lamar, Strong, W. W. 
Holt, Thomas Warner, Law, Dougherty, and Hooper. In 1834, Judges 



^56 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

Crawford and Lamar both died; and in 1851, Judge Strong sank to the 
tomb. 

When we began this memoir we designed introducing the usual 
charge of Judge Warren to the Grand Jury, at the opening of each 
term, as on such occasions he was most faithful and explicit in com- 
plying with the requisitions of the legislature in regard to certain 
offences; but, from the space already occupied, we must relinquish the 
attempt. 

Judge Warren has only two children living ; one, a married daughter, 
residing in Stewart county, and the other a son, who has been admitted 
to the bar, and is still a member of his household. For many years the 
Judge has acted a prominent part in the affairs of his church, frequently 
officiating in the pulpit, and is ever foremost in the promotion of Sun- 
day-Schools, Bible Societies, and other benevolent institutions. He has 
tender sympathies and a charitable heart. Avarice forms no part of 
his nature. His property, though not large, renders him independent. 
Much of his income has been expended in a generous hospitality. 
Preachers, religious persons of all dJenominations, and his friends gene- 
rally, feel quite at home under his roof. 

In person, the Judge is fully six feet high, and weighs about one 
hundred and ninety pounds. His forehead is large and round, eyes 
blue, and complexion fresh and sandy. He steps quick, and is a little 
restless when sitting, unless his attention is much engaged. Owing to 
his kind feelings, which are manifest in his countenance, he does not 
always preserve that order in Court which a more austere visage and 
deportment would command. When the noise amounts to an inter- 
ruption of business, he frequently alarms the bailiffs by threats of a fine 
for a neglect of duty. Perfect silence then reigns for a moment, but 
soon the uproar is renewed, the Judge himself setting the example by 
some pleasantry with the bar. 

As the style of " Lott Warren Division, No. — ," in Sumter county, 
would indicate, the Judge is a son of Temperance. His lectures on 
that subject are very interesting. In fact, his whole time is occupied, 
in some way, in trying to benefit his fellow-beings. In politics, he is 
strictly conservative, and prefers the Union as it is, to any change 
which might be proposed as a remedy for real or imaginary griev- 
ances. 

We have endeavored to exhibit the character and qualities of Judge 
Warren with that fidelity which an acquaintance of twenty-five years 
enables us to exercise. His example ought to stimulate poor and 
friendless youth to strike bravely, and bear up with fortitude, in the 
contest of life. If such shall be the tendency of this memoir, the writer 
will have accomplished his object. 




^^^■by HS Sali 



of Tfrnv&sses 
C2JE Ojt the judge. s cf tss clbcztzt covf.t . 



'<"■"'<?'■ ■'< ' /■r-3rAt«:«CjtrtM^/t<ir o^ Hr/unsnzjww^^.au'.y- 



1 



CHARLES F. KEITH, OF TBKKESSXE. 763 



HON. CHARLES F. KEITH, 

OF TENNESSEE. 

The paternal grandfather of the subject of this memoir was a native 
of Scotland. After the fall of the House of Stuart, to which dynasty he 
was devotedly attached, his estates were confiscated, and he emigrated 
to the North American Colonies and settled in Fauquier county, Vir- 
ginia, where he was for many years an eminent minister of the Episco- 
pal Church. Shortly after his arrival in America he married Miss Mary 
Isham Randolph, a lady remarkable for strength of character, high lite- 
rary attainments and deep piety. They had a large family of children, 
from whom have descended some of the most illustrious men of Vir- 
ginia. Their second daughter married Colonel Marshall, and was the 
mother of the late lamented Chief Justice of that name. Their third son, 
Alexander Keith, the father of the present Judge, was for several years 
an officer in the Revolutionary Army, and took an active part in our 
struggle for independence. About the close of the war, being then a 
widower, he married Mrs. Thornton, formerly Miss Galihue, and took 
up his home in his native county of Fauquier. Here they resided for 
several years, and raised a large and respectable family. Their second 
son, Charles Fleming, was born on the 22d day of November, 1784, 
and in 1799, he removed with his father and family to Tennessee, 
which had only a few years previously been admitted as one of the 
States of the Union. Amid the wild and romantic scenery of that new 
and flourishing commonwealth, he acquired a vigor of constitution and 
a manly reliance on his own energies, which prepared him for the per- 
formance of the arduous duties his country was to impose upon him in 
after life. 

In* 802, he returned to Virginia and commenced the study of law, 
at the early age of eighteen years, with his friend and relative Charles 
Marshall, a brother of the Chief Justice, and at that time a prominent 
member of the bar at Warrenton. He applied himself assiduously to 
the study of that abstruse science, and under the direction of his able 
instructor, acquired a profound knowledge of the elementary principles 
of the law. He resided for two years in the family of Mr. Marshall, 
and the kindness and attention shown him by that worthy gentleman 
and his most excellent lady, were highly appreciated by him, and to 
this day he recurs with the greatest pleasure to the time passed under 
their hospitable roof. He has, indeed, always considered, that he was 
extremely fortunate in preparing himself for the active duties of his 
profession in the office of such an accomplished gentleman and able 
jurist, and one who devoted so much time and attention in assisting 
him to acquire a knowledge of the practice as well as of the theory of 
the law. 

It may be well questioned whether a young man, who has a finished 
education, can select any place better calculated to prepare himself for 
a successful entrance upon the duties and responsibilities of the legal 



V64 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

profession, than the office of a lawyer in full practice, who will make 
him his companion, hold frequent converse with him on legal subjects, 
cause him to investigate cases and transcribe pleadings, and who will 
direct with care all his studies, both literary and professional, and watch 
with interest over the development of his moral and intellectual char- 
acter. The misfortune is that lawyers will very rarely take it upon 
themselves to act in this manner towards their students, and indeed it 
but seldom happens that it is possible for them to do so. Hence young 
men of fortune most generally prefer to seek a law-school to prepare 
themselves for the practice of this profession ; but while they find there 
many advantages which a lawyer's office does not afford, and many 
motives to arouse their energies and stimulate their exertions which 
solitary labor does not excite, yet they have many dangers to encoun- 
ter, and are apt to form inadequate ideas of the responsibilities that 
await them, and to think, when they get their license, they can enter at 
once with eclat and without difficulty upon a successful practice. It not 
unfrequently happens, therefore, that, when thrown into active life, 
they become discouraged at the fearful and severe ordeal through which 
they are required to pass, and consequently resign their profession with 
all its expected honors and emoluments, and betake themselves to some 
other occupation. Fortunately, however, for our country and the profes- 
sion, the system of Moot Courts, which is so well adapted to prepare a 
young man to become a practical and efficient jurist, is beginning to 
assume a prominent position in all our law-schools, and, if properly en- 
forced and adhered to, will make them what they ought to be, the ves- 
tibule, as it were, through which every one should be required to pass 
before he can be permitted to enter that grand and magnificent edifice, 
the temple of the Law, where the rights and liberties of the people are 
investigated and decided. 

This is a topic which would afford abundant material for an extended 
article, but we must return to the subject of our memoir, one of whose 
fellow-students, during his residence in Warrenton, was Richard A. 
Buckner, a young man of accomplished manners and brilliant genius, 
and who has filled with distinction high political and judicial offices in 
Kentucky, his adopted state. 

In 1804, Mr. Keith returned to Tennessee, but being too young to 
be admitted to the bar, he again visited his friends in Virginia, and after 
devoting several months to the study of his profession, returned home 
and commenced the practice of law in 1805, in Jefferson and the adjoin- 
ing counties, where he obtained an extensive and lucrative business. 
The legal profession in East Tennessee at that time combined as much 
talent as has ever been possessed by any portion of the state. It 
ranked among its members such names as White, Whiteside, Scott, 
Trimble and others ; men who have filled some of the highest offices 
in the gift of the nation. It was among such men as these, able and 
profound jurists, that Mr. Keith first entered upon the practice of the 
law, but he applied himself with diligence and energy to the labors of 
his profession, and notwithstanding this brilliant array of talent that 
challenged the homage and admiration of the people, he received a full 
share of the business in all the courts he attended. 

In 1809, his father removed with his family to the State of Mississippi, 






CHARLES F. KEITH, OF TENNESSEE. 765 

and Charles expected to follow after him during the next year, but 
meeting with Miss Elizabeth Douglass, daughter of Philip Hale, who 
emit^rated at a very early period from Virginia and settled on the Nolo- 
chucky River, in what is now Greene county, Tennessee, he became 
enamored of her charms, and was married to her on the 31st day of 
October, 1811. Were it not for extending this article to an inordinate 
length it would be interesting to give an account of the ancestors of this 
amiable lady ; they were originally from Scotland, and their numerous- 
descendants are now scattered throughout the States of Virginia, Ken- 
tucky and Tennessee. 

After his marriage, Mr. K. continued to reside in Jefferson county, 
and acquired great reputation in his profession, to which he applied 
himself most assiduously until the year 1817, when he became a candi- 
date for a seat in the Senate of his state legislature. 

It was at a time when federal politics had but little to do with state 
elections ; parties were not organized as at the present day, and each 
candidate had to rely for success alone upon his personal address and the 
manner in which he acted with respect to the local questions of the 
country. After an animated contest with a gentleman of high respec- 
tability, and great personal popularity, Mr. K. was elected, and took 
his seat in the Senate in the fall of 1817. 

The life of a legislator has but very little of interest attached to it, 
when he is merely pursuing the ordinary routine of business, and his 
time is occupied in attending to the private and local interests of his 
constituents, and when no great questions are presented for discus- 
sion and determination which excite the public mind, and call forth the 
talent and energy of the representatives from different portions of the state. 

Such was the position of our new senator. We shall consequently 
pass over the first session of his political life, remarking that the best 
commentary we can make upon the fidelity with which he represented 
the interests of his constituents, consists in a simple statement of the 
fact, that at the next session of the legislature, two years afterwards, he 
was returned to his seat in the Senate without opposition. 

That session was one of great interest on many accounts. By the 
treaties of 1817 and 181{> the Cherokee tribe of Indians had ceded to 
the United States a large and beautiful tract of country, a portion of 
which was afterwards laid off and called the Hiwassee District. The 
benefit of this purchase, to a certain extent, was given by compact with 
the General Government to the State of Tennessee, and the question 
arose at this session of the legislature as to the manner in which the 
lands should be appropriated. 

A special committee was raised to consider of that important sub- 
ject, and after much deliberation they reported to the Senate a bill 
providing for the exigencies of the case. But the measure proposed by 
the committee was not acceptable to the Senate, and Mr. K. was allowed 
to withdraw the bill for amendment. 

Taking for his model the plan introduced by Mr. Jefferson in the 
Continental Congress in 1784, and subsequently modified at the sugges- 
tion of Messrs. Monroe and Grayson, delegates from Virginia in 1785, 
of laying off the counties into townships of six miles square, and sub 



Y66 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

dividing those into sections and quarter sections, he prepared a different 
bill, more conformable to the wishes of the Senate, as manifested by the 
debates, and offered it in lieu of the one reported by the committee. 
This was a new feature in the legislative history of Tennessee ; but, 
after the most mature reflection, the substitute was adopted by the Se- 
nate without any material alteration. 

It mav be proper here to state, that the Hon. Thomas L. Williams, 
the present distinguished Chancellor of the Eastern Division of the 
State of Tennessee, was a member of the legislature at that time, and 
performed a conspicuous part in the passage of this law. Upon many 
other important occasions his capacious intellect devised measures of 
policy for the government of the state which have redounded greatly to 
the honor and happiness of his countrymen. 

He was an early and fast friend of the able jurist whose character 
forms the subject of this imperfect sketch, and that friendship, in their 
frequent intercourse in life, has been unbroken through a series of years, 
and now forms for them a source of comfort and pleasure as they are 
passing off the stage of action, full of years and full of honors. 

Experience has shown the wisdom of the plan adopted by the legis- 
lature, in 1819, for appropriating lands and defining their boundaries; 
and the State of Tennessee again gave her sanction to it by the Act of 
1837-8. by disposing of the lands in the Ocoee District which had been 
purchased by the treaty of 1835 from the same tribe of Indians. 

It is almost impossible, where lands have been thus surveyed and 
sectioned, for litigation to arise in relation to the true boundaries of 
adjacent tracts. Hence, in the Hiwassee and Ocoee Districts the ab- 
struse learning relative to " ancient boundaries and landmarks" has 
been very rarely called into requisition, and has given the legal profes- 
sion but few fees and but little trouble. In other portions of the state, 
however, where lands were differently appropriated, and each person 
was permitted to make his location of almost any size or shape that he 
desired, and to run the lines in any direction that might suit his fancy, 
innumerable disputes have arisen, and continue to rise, between the 
owners of adjacent lands, and endless controversy and litigation have 
resulted therefrom. 

This is an evil which cannot now be remedied ; but the country owes 
it, in a great measure, to the subject of this memoir, that all that beau- 
tiful country reclaimed from the Indians by the treaties of 1819 and 
1835, was not subjected to a similar calamity. 

At the same session of the legislature, the statute of limitations to 
real estate formed a fruitful topic for debate and controversy. The act 
of 1715, and that of 1797, explanatory of it, had given much dissatis- 
faction to the country, and the greatest diversity of opinion existed, 
both on the bench and amongst the members of the bar, in relation to 
the construction to be given to these acts. Many bitter hostilities ori- 
ginated from the controversies arising out of these statutes, and much 
excitement prevailed amongst the people in relation to the adjustment 
of their land-titles. Mr. K., fully appreciating the evil under which the 
country suffered, gave his whole energies and lent his aid and influence 
to the set lement of this vexed question, and was instrumental in the 



CHARLES F. KEITH, OF TENNESSEE. 767 

passage of a law, prepared by the combined wisdom of the state, which 
gave peace and repose to the country, and harmony to the courts. 

Many other questions of interest to the country, in the management 
and discussion of which Mr. K. acquired much reputation for a correct 
judgment and discriminating intellect, came before that session of the 
legislature, but it it would be tedious to attend to them in detail. The 
best evidence of the high position he occupied amongst his colleagues, 
and of the confidence and affection they entertained for him, exists in 
the fact that, about the close of the session, they elected him judge of 
the 7th (now the 3d) Circuit, over a distinguished member of the same 
General Assembly, who has since filled a high public position as a 
member of Congress, and more recently as a judicial officer in a different 
section of the State of Tennessee. This circuit consisted in part of the 
country that had been purchased from the Indians, and was the largest 
and most laborious one in the state. It embraced a territory one hun- 
dred and fifty miles in length, intersected by mountains and numerous 
large water-courses, and the courts were required to be held semi- 
annually in each county. The entire southern and eastern boundary 
was divided only by rivers from the country belonging to, and occupied 
by, the Cherokee Indians, and many delicate questions arose in relation 
to the conflicting claims between them and the whites. Larire portions 
of the territory were but sparsely inhabited, and very few accommoda- 
tions could be had throughout the country. But the newly elected 
judge, undaunted by any of these difficulties, entered at once with zeal 
and energy upon the discharge of the duties cf nis office. 

In 1820 he removed with his family to M'Minn county, in the Hi- 
wassee district, and selected for his residence a beautiful place on the 
waters of the Eastanalla, which now bears the name of Elmwood. He 
has continued to reside there until the present time, and has seen the 
country advance from a wilderness to a high state of cultivation. 

The life of a judge is one continued scene of toil and labor, with 
very few incidents to vary or materially change the dull monotony of 
the ordinary routine of business. No one act, therefore, can be selected 
from the great mass of his performances, and be looked to as an exem- 
plification of the character and value of the services he renders to his 
country. His history is not like that of the politician, the hero, or the 
statesman. The nature of his official duties does not require, or indeed 
permit, the performance of any of those brilliant achievements which 
dazzle and excite the public mind, and call forth the burst of enthusi- 
astic applause from admiring nations. His highest praise and greatest 
honor consist in a pure, faithful, independent and impartial administra- 
tion of the laws of the country, with a demeanor, quiet, unassuming, and 
dignified, which will command the respect and esteem of all who may 
be thrown within the circle of his influence. While he entertains de- 
cided, known and fixed views upon all great questions of national and 
state policy, and the influence of his character and station is exerted in 
a silent and unostentatious manner in advancing the success of those 
measures, which, in his estimation, will contribute in the greatest de- 
gree to the happiness of his country, he should keep himself entirely 
removed from the exciting contests of political strife, and should not 



768 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

■ enter into the feelings, prejudices and animosities of parties and ac- 
tions. 

Such were the sentiments that shaped the conduct of Judge K. when 
he first toolv his seat upon the bench, and the same pure and impartial 
administration of justice, the same dignified and elevated demeanor to- 
wards all with whom he associates, the same disinterested devotion to 
conservative principles, now mark his intercourse with the world that 
characterized the first years of his judicial life. 

The citizens of his adopted state have rewarded him well for the 
fidelity with which he discharged the high trusts conferred upon him, 
but he has always esteemed more highly the gratitude and affection of 
his countrymen, than all the pecuniary compensation he has received 
for his services. To secure that gratitude and affection has been one 
of the higliest objects of his life, and the consciousness that he enjoys 
them in an eminent degree, is to him a source of infinite gratification. 

As an instance of the confidence the people of Tennessee had in the 
integrity and discretion of the judge, it may be proper to state, that a 
few years after he was elected, the legislature of the state appointed 
him a special commissioner to ascertain and assess the value of occu- 
pant improvements in the Hiwassee District, which had been lost to 
the persons by whom they were made. The assessments amounted to 
a very large sum, but the commission was executed so much to the 
satisfaction of the people, that the legislature directed his certificates 
of the amount due to each claimant to be received as a lawful tender in 
payment for the public lands. 

As an evidence of the delicate and responsible position in which the 
judge was frequently placed in the performance of his official duties, it 
may be proper to refer particularly to one or two cases which are il- 
lustrative of the nature of the business that almost daily came under 
his cognizance. Shortly after Georgia extended her jurisdiction over 
the territory occupied by the Cherokee Indians within her limits, she 
directed a survey to be made of the lands bordering on the State of 
Tennessee. This was believed to be a violation of the intercourse laws 
then in force, and the surveyors were regarded by the Indians as tres- 
passers, and subjected themselves to severe punishment for enter- 
ing on their territory. One of the surveying party having wandered 
from his companions in pursuit of game, was surprised by the Indians, 
who had been watching the movements of the party, and forcibly car- 
ried into the State of Tennessee, where he underwent an examination, 
and, refusing to give bail to answer, was sentenced to be imprisoned, 
but obtained a writ of habeas corpus from Judge K., and was discharged 
by him, on the ground that the Courts of Tennessee could not take ju- 
risdiction of the case, the defendant having been brought by violence, 
and against his will, within the limits of the state. Considerable ex- 
citement prevailed among the Indians as soon as they learned that their 
victim had escaped, and they called upon the judge for a statement of 
his reasons for releasing him. The judge very promptly and kindly 
complied with their request, and gave them a copy of his opinion, and 
it was so satisfactory to them that no further disturbances were made. 

The State of Tennessee having extended her laws over the Indian 



CHARLES r. KEITH, OF TENNESSEE. '769 

territory within her limits, Judge K. declared that he would not enter- 
tain jurisdiction of cases arising within that territory, and when a case 
of homicide came to be tried before him, he sustained a plea in abate- 
ment to the jurisdiction of the court; remarking that the Constitution 
of the United States and the laws and treaties made in pursuance thereof, 
were the supreme law of the land, and that his oath of office and self- 
respect required him to enforce them when they came in conflict with 
the legislation of his own state. This occurred about the time of the 
adoption of the new Constitution by the State of Tennessee, which re- 
quired the judges to be elected for a term of years by the legislature, 
and after some of the members of that body had publicly announced 
that they would support no one who would not enforce the laws of the 
state extending the jurisdiction of the courts over the Indian territory, 
and at a time when the tide of popular feeling was greatly in favor of 
assuming such jurisdiction. 

The judge was, however, sustained by the people in his decision, and 
the firm and independent course pursued by him in relation to that 
case, is but an illustration of the impartiality and disinterestedness with 
which he enforces the laws as he understands them to be. 

It would be labor rather superfluous to allude to other cases which 
came before the judge, as it would be impossible to gather from them 
any correct idea of his conduct, capacity and qualifications. 

The best evidence of the manner in which he discharged the duties 
of his office consists in the opinion entertained by those who were best 
acquainted with his judicial course. We therefore extract from a pa- 
per published some years ago in his own county, a portion of a tribute 
of respect paid to him by his fellow-citizens , 

"It is now twenty-four years since the organization of the third judi- 
cial circuit of the State of Tennessee. During that period the Hon. 
Charles F. Keith has presided over its deliberations. His official con- 
duct has hitherto been and is now well known to the great body of this 
community. A pure, faithful, impartial administration of justice has 
eminently distinguished Judge Keith in the discharge of the duties 
connected with his station. In that portion of his judicial course pe- 
culiarly belonging to the Grand Inquest of the county — the suppression 
of vice and the promotion of virtue have alike distinguished the labors 
and solicitude of this eminent jurist. * * * * We intend by 
this no unmeaning flattery. It is the homage paid by the agricultural 
laborer to judicial integrity and untarnished private honor." 

A very remarkable instance of permanent and devoted attachment 
of a people to their public servants occurred in the person of Judge K. 
In 1819 he was elected for life, or during good behavior. In 1834 the 
tenure of his office was changed to a term of eight years. In 1836 he 
was re-elected, and with the exception of an interval of four years, has 
held the office to the present time, being about thirty-three years since 
he first went upon the bench. Lord Mansfield and Chief Justice Mar- 
shall are the only persons, now in our recollection, who held the office 
of judge for a greater period of time. 

In 1824 the father of Judge K. died in Mississippi, at a very ad- 
vanced age ; and many years after his death his heirs received the 

49 



770 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

bounty lands to which he was entitled as an officer of the Continental 
army, amounting in value at the time to a very large sum. 

The judge has always maintained a character for firmness and inde- 
pendence, candor and punctuality. He has never had any altercations 
with the members of the bar, but on the contrary has always been 
treated by them with the utmost kindness and respect. In all impor- 
tant contested causes which have been tried before him, he has preserved 
extensive notes sufficiently luminous to enable one to make a report 
of the cases. His decisions are prompt, clear and forcible. His labors 
have been immense — such, indeed, as but few constitutions could have 
undergone ; and yet it is a remarkable fact that during his long and 
arduous official duties, he has only lost a portion of one term of his 
courts on account of ill health. He has five sons and four daughters, 
of whom one of the former and two of the latter are married. He has 
never had a death or other serious calamity to occur in his family, and 
in other respects the favors of Providence have been showered upon 
him with a bounteous hand. 

In politics he is a whig. Devotedly attached to the Union of the 
States and the preservation of the Federal Constitution, under which 
the nation has grown to be so great and powerful, he deprecates alike 
that agitation which threatens to array one portion of the confederacy 
against another, and that disposition manifested by some of our coun- 
trymen which prompts them to disregard the time-honored maxims of 
Washington, and the other founders of our government, and entangle 
themselves in all the petty quarrels, dissensions and alliances of foreign 
powers. 

The judge is not at all avaricious, but is prudent, discreet, and libe- 
ral in the expenditure of his means. He possesses a handsome estate, 
upon which he will soon retire from public life to enjoy otium cum 
dignitate. 

Judge K. is still on the bench, pursuing his duties with firmness and 
integrity. Surrounded by a large family, in whose society his chief 
happiness consists, he takes much pleasure in turning their attention to 
literary pursuits and every occupation that is calculated to improve the 
mind and elevate the character. 



1 




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"WILLIAM H. BATTLE, OF NORTH CAROLINA. Y7l 

HON. WILLIAM H. BATTLE, 

OF CHAPEL HILL, NORTH CAROLINA. 

William Horn Battle, at present one of the judges of the Supe- 
rior Courts in North Carolina, was born in the county of Edgecombe 
in that state, on the 17th day of October, 1802. He was the eldest 
son of Joel Battle, a wealthy and enterprising citizen, and a great- 
grandson of Elisha Battle, who moved from Virginia to the banks of 
Tar River, about a century ago, and afterwards became one of the 
pioneers of liberty in North Carolina. After pursuing a preparatory 
course at a variety of academies, the subject of this sketch was trans- 
ferred to the university of the state, at Chapel Hill, in January, 1818, 
and became a member of the Sophomore class. Here he was distin- 
guished as a diligent and successful student, and upon graduating, in 
June, 1820, although at an unusually early age. received the valedictory 
oration, then a prize of the second scholar in the class. Among his 
classmates were Bishop Otey, of Tennessee, and B. F. Moore, Esq., 
the late able attorney-general of North Carolina. In September of the 
same year, Mr. Battle entered the office of the late Chief Justice 
Hendei-son, and remained as a student with him until January, 1824, 
when he obtained license to practise law. It is usual in North Carolina 
for candidates for the bar to undergo two examinations before the Su- 
preme Court, separated by an interval of a year. The first license 
extends to the county courts, whilst the second includes all other tri- 
bunals. Mr. Battle, during his stay with Judge Henderson, having on 
different occasions attended his preceptor as amanuensis, upon his judi- 
cial duties in Raleigh, his proficiency in his studies was so well under- 
stood, that not only did the court decline causing him to undergo a 
regular examination, but insisted upon giving him both licenses at the 
same time. On the first of June, 1825, Mr. Battle married Lucy M., 
daughter of Kemp Plummer, Esq., a distinguished lawyer of Warren- 
ton, North Carolina ; and in January, 1827, settled for the practice of 
his profession in the county of Franklin. 

The early career of our young lawyer gave little promise of future 
success and eminence. Although introduced to the bar with the advan- 
tage of his reputation, both at Chapel Hill and before the Supreme 
Court, and though of exemplary morals and business habits, he went 
the circuit for several years with but little practice. And now, that he 
has reaped the honors of his profession, he is fond of encouraging his 
younger brethren by referring to the time when years of unsuccessful 
competition had so dispirited him, that even the influence of his wife 
could scarcely induce him any longer to face the cheerless prospect 
apparently before him. Instances of early disappointment, followed by 
marked success in later life, are sufficiently frequent in the profession of 
law to deserve attention, and afford the proper comment upon the 
^^ prcepropera praxis''' of its old master. The name of Judge Battle 
may be added to the already illustrious list of men who employed the 



'7*12 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

slow years of constrained leisure which fell to their lot in their early 
professional career, in pondering those weighty sentences with which 
Lord Coke commences that admirable introduction to his £ook of 
Entries : — " He that duely considereth (learned Reader) the theoricke 
and practique parts of the laws of England, that is, the Knowledge in 
aniversalities and the Practise in particulars, shall find that most aptly 
to be applied to this profession that long since was spoken of another 
Ars longa, vita brevis, studium difficile^ occasio prceceps, experimentum 
vericulosum. A learned man in the laws of this realm is long in mak 
ing, the student thereof, having sedentariam vitam, is not commonly 
long-lived, the study abstruse and difficult, the occasion sodaine, the 
practice dangerous." Those who are so happy as to live under the ad- 
ministration of the law by one whom the highest authorities at the 
bar, and upon the bench, in North Carolina, unite in characterizing as 
in every various quality of ability, accomplishment, firmness, purity, 
patience and courtesy, entirely fitted for the highest judicial station, 
will find small cause to regret that William H. Battle spent so little 
of his time, twenty-five years ago, upon the assault arid battery, and 
vetition dockets of his circuit ; nor will they be slow to acknowledge 
the claim upon North Carolina, of that gentle and patriotic influence 
which preserved one of its chief ornaments to the magistracy of the 
state. 

The county of Franklin, in those days, supported the administration 
of General Jackson, by a vote of at least seven to one ; and Mr. Battle 
found himself with small prospect in the line of political promotion. 
However, having been twice defeated in previous years, he was elected 
to the lower house of the legislature, in 1833, by a very large, and in 
that county, almost unprecedented majority. He was chosen a second 
time, in spite of violent political opposition, in 1834 ; and under writ- 
ten instructions, prepared after his election and signed by a large ma- 
jority of the voters in the county, voted for the Hon. Bedford Brown 
for United States Senator. Although thus ready to acknowledge the 
right of the people, under proper circumstances, to control the action of 
a representative, yet during the same session he strenuously opposed, 
and in a minority of twenty-eight out of some two hundred members, 
voted against the abstract proposition that the legislature has a right to 
instruct senators in Congress. Mr. Battle never was a partisan. 
Although decided in his views of public policy, his natural temper was 
adverse to the heats and bitterness of public life. Excepting an at- 
tendance upon the convention which nominated General Harrison for 
the presidency, in 1839, his career as a politician closed with his second 
session in the legislature. Since that time he has given himself entirely 
to his profession, and although he may retain ancient preferences for 
principles, no man is more conscientiously alive to the necessity for 
excluding from his present sphere of duty the fatal attraction and bias 
of partisanship. 

In 1832, Mr. Battle had occupied himself in preparing for the press 
a second edition of the first volume of Haywood* s Reports. Members 
of the bar in North Carolina take great pride in the ability displayed 
in this early record of the decisions of the state tribunals. A learned 
gentleman remarked some twenty years since, that, although a constant 



•WILLIAM. H BATTLE, OF NORTH CAROLINA. 773 

reader of the English Reports, the only case from the American books 
which he had seen cited in them, was that of Ingram vs. Hall, contained 
in 1st Haywood, in which the court considers and exhausts the com- 
mon law learning upon the question — what are the essentials of a deed? 
A second edition of this book being called for, Mr. Battle undertook 
the task, and greatly improved it by the addition of notes, directing 
the reader's attention to such changes as, in the course of forty years, 
legislation or new decisions had introduced into the state law. The 
manner in which he acquitted himself of this employment, made so 
favorable an impression upon the governor of the state, that in the 
course of the next year he was appointed, in connection with two emi- 
nent gentlemen of much longer standing at the bar, upon a commis- 
sion raised by order of the legislature to revise the statutes. Pre- 
viously to this time, questions connected with the lex scripta were the 
most perplexing of any that engaged the attention of the practitioner 
in North Carolina. Various acts, it is true, extending from the year 
1715 to 1820, had been passed by the legislature, which affected to 
define the portion of English enactment in force here ; but the style of 
definition that was adopted — embraced for instance in such expressions 
as all statute laws of England — '■'•providing for the privileges of the 
people^^ or, '■'■preventing immorality and fraud^'' or, " not otherwise 
'provided for in the whole or in part^^ or, lastly, " not become obsolete^'' 
shall be recognized as laws of this state, left the matter as much in 
doubt as before. In order to simplify the subject, commissioners were 
appointed in 1817 to enumerate and specify the British statutes still 
to be regarded as law. This was done ; but as the specification did not 
have the effect of repealing such acts as were omitted in the report, 
and was in no part entitled to more weight than that due to the legal 
reputation of the gentlemen who made it, it is manifest that there was 
still room for hesitation. So true is this, that in North Carolina, as 
late as 1835, a counselor could not give advice upon many matters of 
every-day importance without consulting Ruff head's Statutes at Large ; 
and then, having found the statute applicable to his case, perplexing 
himself infinitely, not only upon questions of obsolete phraseology, but 
also much more about nice points connected with the privileges of the 
people, technical immorality and fraud, repugnancy to freedom, and so 
forth — points of embarrassment created, we may add, by the benevo- 
lent wish upon the part of our state legislators to free the subject from 
its manifold difficulties. To rid the profession of this incubus, and to 
render private citizens more certain of the law under which they were 
living, Governor Swain prevailed upon the General Assembly to order 
the new commission, upon which he appointed Mr. Battle, in connection 
with Ex-Governor Iredell and Gavin Hogg, Esq., the place of the 
last-named gentleman, in consequence of his declining health, having 
been subsequently filled by the Hon. Frederick Nash, now of the Su- 
preme Court, After three years, the commissioners submitted the 
revised statutes to the inspection of the legislature. The publication of 
this volume was an era in the history of law in North Carolina. The 
lex scripta became settled, citizens were less in danger of innocently 
involving themselves in litigation, professional gentlemen were no 
onger necessarily in doubt as to their opinions, and the legislature, by 



774 SKETCHE3 OF BMlKINT AMERICANS. 

a knowledge of what was the existing condition of the statutes, was 
better enabled to apply the hand of amendment and reform. 

In 1834, Mr. Battle had been associated with Mr. Devereux in re- 
porting the decisions of the Supreme Court. Upon the resignation of 
the latter gentleman in 1839, he became sole reporter. The duties of 
this office requiring an almost constant residence in Raleigh, he removed 
his family to that place in the same year. In August, 1840, upon the 
resignation of Judge Toomer, Mr. Battle was appointed by Governor 
Dudley, and in the following winter elected by the legislature, one of the 
judges of the Superior Courts. His ties to Raleigh being thus severed, 
and being desirous of superintending in person the collegiate education 
of his sons, he removed in 1843 to Chapel Hill, where he still continues 
to reside. In 1845, he was elected by the Trustees of the University 
to the Professorship of Law, without any regular salary, however, and 
with no part in the government of the institution. In May, 1848, he 
was appointed by Governor Graham one of the judges of the Supreme 
Court, in the place of the Hon. Joseph I. Daniel, deceased, but failed 
to have that appointment confirmed by the legislature ; although by the 
same body, upon the resignation of the Hon. Augustus Moore, he was, 
without opposition, chosen to fill again the seat which he had vacated in 
the spring preceding. The cause of his failure before the legislature is 
best explained by the following correspondence, which appeared in the 
newspapers of the day : — 

" House of Commons, ) 

"January 9, 1849. j 

" Dear Sir : — We have to-day, by a vote highly honorable to the 
General Assembly, determined, by electing you to the office of judge 
of the Superior Court, to do justice to the wishes of a large majority of 
the good people of North Carolina, without distinction of party. 

"The preference of another to you for a still higher judicial station, 
was owing principally to your residing in a county where there are 
already three judges, a governor, and a senator in Congress. 

" In the name of our constituents, and as your friends, we most re- 
spectfiilly ask that you will accept the honor now tendered you by a 
vote of so large a portion of both parties in the General Assembly. 

" We ask leave to offer our congratulations to you, that in the midst 
of great excitement, no man has attributed to you the slightest impro- 
priety, either in your official or personal conduct — and that you have 
not sought office, but office has sought you. 

"With high respect, your ob't serv'ts, 

" Edward Stanly, " Newton Coleman, 
Wm. L. Long, W. B. Wadsworth, 

Richard H. Smith, J. S. Erwin, 

r. B. Satterthwaite, A. G. Logan, 
W. J. Blow, Thomas J. Person, 

R. G. A. Love, Robert Giluam. 

" Hon. William H. Battle, ) 

Chapel HilV ] 



WILLIAM H. BATTLE, OF NORTH CAROLINA 775 

" Raleigh, January 9th, 1849.* 
"Gentlemen: — I have the honor to acknowledge the receipt of your 
letter of to-day, informing me that the General Assembly have, by a 
large vote, given without distinction of party, elected me a judge of the 
Superior Courts. For this proof of the confidence of the representatives 
of the people, exhibited without any solicitation on my part, in the 
midst of much party excitement, 1 feel profoundly grateful. 

"If a proper sense of the duty which every man owes to his country, 
were not alone sufficient to induce me to accept the important and 
responsible office which has been tendered to me, the very kind man- 
ner in which you, whom 1 take pride in numbering among my warmest 
friends, press ray acceptance of it, would scarce leave me at liberty to 
decline it. 

" The complimentary terms in which you have been pleased to allude 
to the propriety of my official and personal conduct, have excited in me 
no ordinary emotions of satisfaction, and will serve, I trust, as an ad- 
ditional incentive to urge me to endeavor to secure the approbation of 
my friends and my country. 

" With high consideration, 

" 1 am, sincerely yours, 

" WiL. H. Battle. 
" To Hon. Edward Stanly, and others.''^ 

To those who are aware of the amount of prejudice which springs 
up in other parts of a state against localities that, by temporal good 
fortune or by accident, have secured a larger portion of official pa- 
tronage than properly falls to their share — a prejudice neither unnatural 
nor generally unwholesome — Judge Battle's want of success will bring 
but little surprise. On the contrary, they will consider it no small com- 
pliment that a resident of Orange county should be regarded as possess- 
ing qualities such as to overcome, in any degree, the natural aversion to 
heap distinction upon a portion of the state already honored beyond its 
comparative deserts. Since his re-election. Judge Battle has been 
sedulously engaged in discharging the high duties of his office. No one 
better adorns judicial station. Although rivaled, or even excelled, in 
particular endowments, yet in the sum of qualities desirable in a judge, 
it were not easy to approach nearer to the model of a magistrate, or to 
afford a finer exemplar to all who are ambitious of the highest honors 
of their profession. 

It is cause of regret that we have upon record so few specimens of 
Judge Battle's judicial powers. In North Carolina, no report is made of 
the proceedings of the Superior Courts; and during the short time in 
which the judge sat upon the Supreme Court bench, no case of any 
very great importance or novelty came up for decision. However, there 
is in the Heports a dissenting opinion filed by Judge Battle, in a case ot 
murder, which attracted considerable attention at the time. The point 
upon which the appeal turned was the competency of evidence of the 



* It appears from the paper which we quote, that unexpectedly to the jsrentlemen 
whose names appear to the above letter. Judge Battle had arrived in Raleigh pend- 
ng the election, for the purpose of appearing as counsel before the Supreme Court 



776 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

general character of the person killed, w ith a view to mitigate the slay- 
ing to manslaughter. As the dissenting opinion deals rather in argu- 
ments derived from the obvious principles of human nature, than in 
those based upon precedent or mere technicality, w^e present an extract 
as a specimen of Judge Battle's manner: 

" 1 cannot concur with the majority of the court upon the question of 
the admissibility of testimony offered by the prisoner, to show the 
character of the deceased for violence. * * * All the facts and cir- 
cumstances which surround the main fact of the homicide, in a judicial 
investigation, become matters of vital importance, and ought to be ad- 
mitted in evidence whenever they promise to throw the least light upon 
it. It seems to me, that the character of the deceased for violence is one 
of those attending circumstances which will always have some, and often 
an important bearing upon that which must necessarily be the subject 
of inquiry — that is : What were the motives which impelled the slayer 
to act 1 Take first the case where the prisoner excuses himself upon 
the ground that he killed the deceased in self defence. To sustain this 
allegation, he must show, to the satisfaction of the jury, that he was 
assailed, and that, before he gave the fatal blow, he retreated as far as 
he could with safety to his own life, or that the violence of the assault 
was such that retreat was impracticable. Is it not manifest that his 
apparent danger would depend much upon the general character of the 
assailant for mild and amiable, or for violent and ungovernable disposi- 
tion ? From an assailant of the former character he would have little 
to fear under circumstances in which, from one of the latter, his life 
would be in imminent peril. Let it be recollected, also, that he has to 
judge and to act at the instant upon the most tremendous responsibility. 
If he strike too soon, he is condemned to a felon's death upon the gallows; 
if too late, he falls by the hand of his adversary. Surely the jury that tries 
him ought not to require proof of the same forbearance when attacked 
by a man of blood as when by one generally of peaceable deportment. 
Undoubtedly his danger would be greater in the one case than in the 
other. Why, then, it may be asked, shall he not be allowed to prove 
it? Evidence of the superior physical strength of the deceas^'.d is 
always admitted. Why, then, not admit evidence of that which gives 
to physical strength much of its force and all of its dangerousness 1 It 
appears to me, likewise, that the privilege which the prisoner has of 
showing his own reputation for peaceable demeanor is of an analogous 
nature. Testimony for the prisoner of this latter kind is not only ad- 
missible, but it has been said by authority very high in North Carolina, 
that it is frequently of much weight. * * But it is said, that the right 
to kill does not depend upon the character of the slain ; that the law 
throws the mantle of its protection alike over the violent and the gen 
tie, as the rain falls from heaven equally upon the just and the unjust. 
It is true, that the killing of a violent and bloodthirsty man, without 
provocation or excuse, is as much murder as the killing of any other 
man ; but I contend that, in ascertaining whether there was any such 
provocation or excuse, the character of the man for violence affords im- 
portant presumptive testimony in behalf of the accused. It is urged, 
again, that where the proof that there was no legal provocation is posi- 
aive and clear, the evidence of character can have no effect, and therefore 



WILLIAM H. BATTLE, OF NORTH CAROLINA. 77*7 

ought to be rejected. To this I may answer, that plenary proof upon 
one side can never justify the rejection of testimony otherwise cornp^- 
tent upon the other. The argument so advanced appears to me to con 
found the competency of testimony with its ejfecV — State vs. Barfield, 
8 Iredell, 344, et seq. 

Judge Battle is yet in the prime of judicial life. A constitution 
naturally good, and well fortified by regularity of life and even tem- 
per, has preserved his outer man from the marks incident to vita 
sedentaria and close study. As an officer and as a man he is remarka- 
bly popular, and enjoys the entire confidence of the community. In 
truth, it seems to be one great aim of his life to render the administra^ 
tion of justice acceptable, — not wholly unacceptable even to the punished. 
In no case has he sought or indeed placed himself in the way of official 
advancement. Unless in some exalted sense, we may say, that in a free 
country and uncorrupted age, he who most clearly manifests his fitness 
for high office most seeks promotion, and most places himself in its way. 
So has it been in North Carolina in the past, consecrated by the eleva- 
tion of Haywood, Taylor, Henderson, and Gaston ; so all admit it to be 
now whilst Ruffin presides in the last resort ; and that it may continue 
the enviable distinction of the state to a late posterity, must ever be 
the fervent prayer of her true citizens. We have confidence that this 
reputation will never suffer by any act upon the part of Judge Battle. 
Except in the way of earning, through long years, a name for modest 
excellence, unstained and unobtrusive morality, unwavering courtesy, 
extensive learning, and a judgment firm and impartial, it cannot be said 
that he ever solicited any man's influence or vote. With hearty acknow- 
ledgment of the past usefulness of this her worthy son, his native state 
looks forward to many other years of service and renown. 

In stature, Judge Battle is under the average size. He walks with an 
active step, is uniformly neat in his person, has an engaging address, 
and his features commonly wear a pleasant smile. He is a consistent 
member of the Episcopal Church. Since 1833 he has occupied a seat 
on the board of trustees of his Alma Mater. In this capacity he is a 
zealous and useful co-worker with his friend President Swain in carry- 
ing forward many improvements which distinguish the later years of the 
university. We have before us two printed addresses by Judge Battle, 
one delivered at Wake Fore^-t College in 1840, the other in 1843, upon 
the death of Judge Gaston, btibre the students of the university. Al- 
mough he has thus occasionally ventured into the walks of literature, 
we cannot find that he has at any time been a regular votary of the 
Muses. Indeed, as since the time of Blackstone it has been quite the 
rage with lawyers, upon arriving at a certain time of life, or in entering 
upon the duties of some engrossing office, to labor out and publish a 
score of creaking elegiacs in farewell of such Muse as up to that time 
they may have fancied themselves faithful to, and as we have never 
stumbled upon anything of this sort from Judge Battle, it is fair to con- 
clude that he has never entered into such bonds. Nor would it be diffi- 
cult to hit upon the direction in which his vows have gone up. He is 
very happy in his domestic relations, and whenever oflf his circuit, if 
not engaged with his law classes, or in advancing his acquaintance with 



778 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

his profession, may be found in the bosom of his family. That he may 
fail in no index of the good citizen, Judge Battle has been blessed with 
a goodly number of promising children. We trust that the future has 
in store for him every happiness that can fall to the lot of the Christian, 
the good husband, father, and friend. 




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.Ena^TorjTwararhuxdySkeUrhes ^fji^TrLzner^-^Trisru^aj'^ 






JOSEPH HENRY LUMPKIN, OF GEORGIA. 779 

I 

JOSEPH HENRY LUMPKIN, 

CHIEF JUSTICE OF THE SUPREME COURT OF GEORGIA. 

The life of Judge Lumpkin cannot be considered as an eventful one. . 
That is, it affords but few incidents which, by reason of the publicity, 
attract the ey§ of the world. Although he has been connected in vari- 
ous ways with every valuable, social, and moral interest of his native 
state, and has, in fact, contributed as much to their advancement as any 
living citizen, yet he was a public man only for a brief, although bril- 
liant period. How distinctly he would have stamped his strong and 
ardent character upon the nation, had he pursued the career of the poli- 
tician, those who know him can well imagine. His life, however, as 
it has been, and still is, is a theme rich in material for comment — a 
healthful, vigorous product of our free institutions, not the less instruc- 
tive because not national. To speak of him with just commendation^ 
to exhibit the stroag points of his character with anything like fairness, 
without doing violence to that modest sensibility which is one of his 
most marked peculiarities — we feel to be a task of some delicacy. To 
portray the inner life, to delineate the heart and illustrate the genius of 
such a man, will be the work of some other hand and of some future 
day. Long may this be deferred, since it cannot be appropriately 
done until, in the cold obstruction of the tomb, his ear shall be deaf to 
the voice of merited praise. This sketch pretends to no more than to 
exhibit the outlines of his character, and some of the more prominent 
events of his life. That he has foilings, no one would be more prompt 
to admit than himself. Who of woman born, save the Saviour of the 
World, has been found without them ? We dismiss them with the 
single remark, that they are few, and lean to virtue's side. 

Judge Joseph Henry Lumpkin was born of highly respectable 
parentage, on the 23d day of December, 1799, in the county of Ogle- 
thorpe. At an early age he entered the University of Georgia, then 
under the presidency of the late Dr. Finley — a man of liberal endow- 
ments and distinguished philanthropy. Dr. Finley having died, and 
the University being without a head, he left it for Princeton, where he 
joined the junior class half advanced. There he was graduated in one 
of the best classes which that fine institution has ever turned out, with 
the second honor. The fact that the salutatory addresses were awarded 
to him at Nassau-Hall, having entered so far advanced as he did, and 
with such intense competition as his class afforded, is quite sufficient 
evidence of his assiduity and scholarship. His proficiency in the ancient 
classics particularly, was remarkable. Nor r .- iie lost his relish for this 
kind of lore. He is not only now a good cla^ ^^A scholar, but his mind 
is full of the truth, and sentiment, and imagery, of the ancient orators and 
poets. His familiarity with them has, no doubt, contributed to mould 
his character somewhat upon the model of the good and great men 
of antiquity; for although, with any one of them all, his character 
affords points of striking contrast, yet, with some of them, it also 
affords points of resemblance. He has Aristides' sense of justice and 



780 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

Cicero's patriotism for example. His use of the Latin language in his 
public addresses, and in the graver literature of his judicial opinions, 
is very felicitous. That forceful power of language which so emi- 
nently characterizes his oratory, is to be attributed, in a high degree, to 
his acquaintance with the roots of our own tongue. In 1845 he was 
invited to deliver the annual commencement oration before the literary 
societies of his Alma Mater. Circumstances constrained him to decline 
this invitation. When it is remembered that this is one of the highest 
literary distinctions which that venerable institution can bestow, how 
wide is the field for selection, and how few of the really great men of 
the country have been invited to its acceptance, it is not too much to 
claim it as a tribute to elevated character andliterary eminence. Had 
he appeared before the learned and polite audience which graced the 
occasion, he would have justified the wisdom of the selection, and vindi- 
cated his claim to the honor. 

Early after his return from college he organized the Phi Kappa 
Society at the University of Georgia, and gave it a constitution and by- 
laws. Already had the Demosthenian Society been many years in 
existence. The two, in generous and profitable rivalry as schools of 
rhetoric, attest his youthful patronage of letters. In 184G he was 
elected Professor of Rhetoric and Oratory in Franklin College. This 
chair he felt it his duty to decline. Immediately afterwards he was 
chosen Professor of Law in the same institution. The department of 
law not having as yet been organized and endowed, this office, which he 
still holds, is merely honorary. Doubtless, the object of the Board of 
Trustees, in tendering it to him, was to secure his services when cir- 
cumstances would enable them fully to endow a professorship, so neces- 
sary to this flourishing institution. In 1845, with his wife and daughter, 
in pursuit of health — which had become impaired by long and intense 
devotion to his profession — to gratify his eager thirst for knowledge, 
and to behold the beauties and wondrous relics of classic lands, he made 
the tour of the continent, visiting England, Scotland, and the principal 
states of Southern Europe. He saw, for himself, Italy — the land of 
venerable renown — her melancholy and magnificent monuments, her 
mouldering ruins, the abjectness of her people, and her moral desolations. 
He felt the inspiration of her clime, and returned, no doubt, a wiser and 
better, certainly a more healthful man. He was asked what places in 
Italy interested him most. He replied, the Three Taverns, where St. 
Paul met the Roman Christians, and the tomb of Virgil. Tlie answer 
was characteristic, illustrating his devotion as a Christian, and his enthu- 
siasm as a classic. Judge Lumpkin is not a mere lawyer. He lays 
no claim to accurate and profound science ; yet he has useful general 
scientific knowledge. He may be, however, said to be well versed in 
moral science. He understands well the science of the Bible; he 
abounds in useful, practical information, and keeps pace with the im- 
provements and events of the day. His taste is good : he loves the 
pure English undefiled, and delights in " books which are books." ^ It 
may not be said of him that, like Murray, he drinks wine with the wits, 
for he drinks wine with nobody ; but it may be said of him that, like 
Murray, he is both a learned jurist and polite scholar. He, too, is like 
Hale, an able judge and Christian philosopher. With such satisfactory 



^ JOSEPH HENRY LUMPKIN, OF GEORGIA. 781 

outlines, we leave, as we need must, his literary character, and pass to 
other matters. 

in February, 1821, he was married to Miss Callender Grieve, the 
daughter of Mr. John Grieve, a very respectable merchant in Lexington, 
between whom and himself a mutual affection had existed and been 
confessed from early childhood. This union has been productive of as 
much happiness as ever falls to the lot of humanity, and proves that 
wedded blibs is in proportion to the purity of motive with which the 
connection is. formed. He is primitive, and I will add, pure enough, 
to denounce the politic unions now so common, and to believe that affec- 
tion is the only reliable guarantee of domestic happiness. Eminently 
domestic in his habits, he has sought and found peace in the bosom 
of his family. What the honors of intellect and station, the applause of 
the world, and the esteem of good men even, do not always yield — 
contentment — he has found in a happy home. There, he is priest and 
ruler, counselor and friend. He governs his household, but it is by the 
law of kindness, illustrating one of his favorite ideas — that love is the 
greatest agency of influence. In the midst of a numerous family, sur- 
rounded with children who look up to him with affectionate reverence, 
with servants who yield him a willing obedience, and with friends 
who respect and appreciate him, he is a just and beautiful exponent of 
the charities of private life. He is pleased with little children, and de- 
lights to caress them, and they, with natural perception of adult sin- 
cerity, hang about him as a true friend. He is peculiarly fond of female 
society, apparently preferring those kind, gentle and unselfish qualities 
in woman, which in him are blended with the sterner attributes of 
his own sex. His female friends will testify that he does not lower 
them to the condition of agreeable pets — the solace of a leisure hour — 
but respects them as associates, with social rights and intellectual claims 
equal to his own, and with great moral obligations and severe practical 
duties resting upon them. His character shines with its clearest and 
most graceful light in his intercourse with those around him. His 
manners seem to combine the simplicity of nature with refinement of 
good breeding. He loves truth and justice ; and such a person, in his 
intercourse with the world, will abide the great Scripture rule of polite- 
ness — " As ye would that men should do to you, do ye also to them 
likewise." As proof of his generous nature and warm heart, few men 
have more numerous or more attached friends. Particularly are the 
young attracted to, and constrained to love him. This is owing, in part, 
to the admiration, natural to them, of his genius, learning, and fine 
character ; but chiefly because he is kind to them — imparting to them 
of the stores of his rich experience, counseling them with candor, 
sympathizing with their hope and ardor, and inspiring them with his 
own lofty estimate of truth and duty. With his equals in position he 
is polite and plain, perhaps a little sparing in deference, and certainly 
careless of display. Towards all who on any account might be con- 
sidered his inferiors, his manner is kind and affable, even gentle, yet very 
far from a patronizing condescension. We have been much with him 
for a number of years, and we have never known him to address a 
servant harshly. He is a mirthful companion, loves a good thing, and 



782 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICAHS, 

knows how to appreciate a good-tempered jest, even when at his owa 
expense. 

The crowning excellence of his character is his piety. It is that 
which gives to it its highest dignity and its most beautiful ornament. 
Without piety, indeed, no man can attain to that perfection of which 
human nature is capable. 

In August, 1828, he united with the Presbyterian Church, :u Lexing- 
ton, thus early consecrating himself to the service of Heaven. At one 
time he took an active part in the affairs of the Church, v^ ry frequently 
attending its judicatories. Of late years he has declined this kind ot 
service, except so far as his immediate church is concerned. Believing 
in, and upholding the forms of Christian worship, according to the gov- 
ernment and discipline of his own denomination — he is still not de- 
pendent upon them alone for his religious enjoyments. If one might 
venture to judge of such a matter, it would seem that, as he grows 
older, he seeks them more in that communion which the regenerated 
spirit holds by direct communication with the spirit of God. The 
enlightened and matured Christian realizes more fully than others, that 
it is not alone at Jerusalem, or on the mountain of Samaria, that God 
is to be worshiped ; for while his Temple is the Universe, his dwelling- 
place is the heart of the humble. It may be more than ordinarily dif- 
ficult for a lawyer to maintain a consistent religious character ; yet it is 
not impossible. True, his vocation is not favorable to contemplative 
piety, and his temptations to err are great; but it gives the most pro- 
pitious field for the practice of Christian virtues. When legal science, 
reputation, eloquence and piety unite at the bar, we know of no condi- 
tion of life more favorable to usefulness. The position of such a person 
gives him command over a larger mass of his fellow-men, than that of 
any other. His moral teachings, when sustained by consistent conduct, 
commend themselves in this — that they are not ex cathedra. The reli- 
gious lawyer is watched with stricter vigilance, and his conduct sub- 
jected to greater severity of judgment, than other professors. This is 
owing to a false estimate of the legal profession. The common idea 
that the practice of the law is a system of tricks and chicane, and that 
lawyers are Swiss, who fight for pay, recognizing a system of moral 
obligation in the court-room which they repudiate in private life, is an 
unfounded and cruel slander. It is not their vocation, however often 
asserted, to make the worse appear the better cause. This was not the 
view taken of them at pagan Rome, as is manifest in the admonition of 
the Roman law on the duties of an advocate : " Ante omnia autem 
universi Advocati ita prasbeant patrocinia jurgantibus, ut non ultra 
quam litium poscit utilitas in licentiam conviciandi et male dicendi 
temeritam prorumpant. Agant quod causa desiderat; tempereret se 
ab injuria. Nemo ex industria protrabat jurgium." This idea has 
reached us from that age which followed the destruction of the Roman 
empire, and which preceded the Christian reformation. It is strength- 
ened by an occasional mal-exponent and by caricatures, which writers 
of fiction are constrained to make, to feed the vicious tastes of their 
readers. The law is the science of truth and justice, and its practitioners, 
under the restraints and guidance of the rules and forms of courts of 
justice, with the environment of professional honor, and under the 



JOSEPH HENRY LUMPKIN, OF GEORGIA. 783 

sanctions of Christianity, fill one of the highest vocations of humanity. 
The heart of the enlightened lawyer desireth liberal things. In Eng- 
land for some centuries, in this country at and since the revolution, 
the lawyers, as a class, have done more to foster liberty, to refine so- 
ciety, and to sustain the institutions of our holy religion, than any other 
class. Religion has never suffered in the person of Judge Lumpkin. 
He has always been free from reproach. The principles of the New 
Testament, carried with him into his consultations, the court-room, his 
private walks, and public duties, have, like an anchor, held him steady 
amidst the buffetings of life's wildest storms. Often a peacemaker to 
many, a spiritual adviser, a Sabbath-school teacher, giving freely to the 
support of the Church, given to hospitality, preferring the doctrines and 
discipline of his own denomination, yet catholic to others, and in all 
things adorning his profession by a consistent walk and conversation, 
he is a fair impersonation of a Christian lawyer. Prompted by sym- 
pathy with the sufferings of men, women and children, and instigated 
by a sense of obligation to do good, when he had opportunity, he 
became, soon after he entered upon life, a Temperance advocate. He 
saw, as who does not see, that from intemperance springs, at the lowest 
estimate, one-half the crime and suffering which afflict society. He 
saw it to be a national vice. Here, then, was an enterprise of charity, 
which might ennoble genius, and which was worthy a life-time effort. 
This sweeping ruin, this expanding and all-enveloping evil, so degradmg, 
so destructive of all the valuable ends and aims of civilized man, 
poisoning the fountains of social peace, and undermining the founda- 
tions of monetary prosperity, has elicited for years the whole strength 
of his resistance, and evoked the most striking displays of his oratory. 
His has not been a fitful antagonism. Steadily and zealously, by ex- 
ample, by argument, the most fruitful illustration, by appeals the most 
persuasive, and by a judicious patronage of every feasible expedient, 
he has given himself to the Temperance reform. Even amidst all its 
fluctuations, he has stood forth its leader and champion, unremitting in 
effort, unrivaled in ability. In Georgia, and in the adjoining states, 
he is the universally accredited Apostle of Temperance ; a laborer, 
meriting fraternity with his judicial contemporary, Mr. Justice O'Neal, 
of South Carolina, in whom are most delightfully blended the elements 
of charity and learning. Whatever may be due to Judge Lumpkin's 
ability as a Temperance advocate, much, very much of his influence 
must be attributed to his long, earnest, self-sacrificing devotion to the 
cause. 

His connection with politics was an episode in the drama of life; 
He was returned to the legislature from Oglethorpe, for the years 
eighteen hundred and twenty-four and five, succeeding, we believe, the 
lamented Upson. At no time did party politics rage with more violence. 
A fearful contest was being waged between the State of Georgia and 
the General Government, relative to the Creek lands — involving ques- 
tions of state and federal jurisdiction, which threatened the peace of 
the Union. The old Crawford and Clark parties in the state divided 
upon these questions, and the domestic strife raged with exceeding 
great violence and acrimony. George M. Troup was then the head of 
the State Rights party, and a gallant leader he was — a man of self-ieli- 



784 8KBTCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

ance, decision and firmness. Elected to the government, he appointed 
Judge Lumpkin one of his aids, and there it was, and still is, his good 
fortune, in the language of that day, " to stand high in the confidence of 
the Governor." Into this state and national contest he entered vrith 
the ardor of youth, hope, and ambition. For the two years that he re- 
presented the county of Oglethorpe, the storm was at its maximum 
point of violence. He at once took position in the legislature by the 
side of the ablest men of those memorable sessions. His eloquence, 
youth, and chivalric bearing, made him a favorite with his party, and he 
became the observed of all observers. The road to any honor the 
state could award lay open before him. But, at its culminating point, 
this blazing star disappeared from the heavens ; it did not explode — or 
go down, or grow dim — but retired from its sphere. There is nothing 
in his brief political career so admirable as his quitting it. The claims 
of his family — his love of domestic life — and perhaps some doubts or 
fears about the moral expediency of political life, with its exacting and 
unsatisfiable excitement — constrained him to yield his position, and 
forego its fascinating promises. He resolved to abandon politics un- 
conditionally, and he has kept his purpose to this day. Rarely do we 
find a sterner exhibition of moral courage. His political opinions were 
formed in the school of the State Rights party ; and with that party, 
through its mutations, he has acted, without, however, uncharitable or 
very exclusive adhesiveness ; although out of active politics, he has 
ever been an observant statesman, well versed in national affairs, and 
profoundly sensible to all that concerns the honor or interest of his na- 
tive state. 

Having studied the law in the office of the late Judge Cobb, a man 
of distinguished professional character, and eminent for his services in 
both branches of the national legislature, he was admitted to the bar in 
October, eighteen hundred and twenty, and immediately thereafter 
opened an office in Lexington, in the county of his nativity. His success 
was immediate; for, the first year of his practice, he realized an income 
of two thousand dollars, reversing the old saying, that a prophet hath 
honor but in his own country. Among other tests of his worth, he has 
been, from his youth upward, a favorite with the intelligent community 
in whose midst he was born. The income of his first professional 
year, considering the competition with which he was surrounded, and 
the amount of business in a country circuit, exhibits him as a successful 
debutant. He lingered not, as many great men have done for many 
years, a briefless lawyer, but sprang, almost joer saltern, to the head ot 
his profession. About him, in the maturity of years and professional 
fame, were not a few of the first men of the day. These it was his 
necessity, perhaps his pride, to encounter. The contestation was with 
athletce trained to the course. His antagonists were worthy of his 
steel. They had experience and reputation ; he had neither — but those 
qualities which sometimes supply the want of both, integrity, talent, in- 
dustry, and the irrepressible, inspiring consciousness of power. I will 
not say that he vanquished them, but he stood very soon upon their 
level, and they were constrained to acknowledge him a peer. That he 
reached this elevation at once, is not true, for his was the experience 
of all, from Coke down, who have attained to eminence in our noble 



JOSEPH HENRY LUMPKIN, OF GEORGIA. 785 

science, to wit : that time, profound study, and close application, 
can alone command its masters. His rise, however, was rapid, and, 
with a large income, he pursued a brilliant upward course for twenty- 
four years, until, in fact, with health broken by professional efforts so 
long continued, and so exhausting, he was compelled, in eighteen hun- 
dred and forty-four, to retire. What he may have considered a calami- 
ty was a fortunate thing for his country — for his inability to pursue the 
practice was, no doubt, the occasion of his being called to the Supreme 
Court Bench. If the limits of this article would allow, it would be 
both pleasant and proper to sketch, in brief, the men, most of them now 
dead, who led the van of the northern, western, and Ocmulgee circuits, 
when Judge Lumpkin came to it — such men as Upson, Clayton, Cobb, 
D. G. Campbell, Payne, Shorter, Gordon, Willis, Harris, and others. 
These are all with the dead. Alas ! that such men should die, and 
take hence so much of public spirit, learning, wit, and wisdom. The 
elements of his success at the bar were integrity, industry, learning, 
and eloquence. 

His integrity never has been for a moment questioned. He has been 
all his life a working man ; and he permitted no other business pursuits 
to divert him from the profession. Politics, which hinders the rise of 
so many men at the bar, he repudiated. During his professional course, 
the labors of the lawyer were greater in Georgia than in many of the 
states, because of the fact that the state had been from the beginning 
without a supreme corrective tribunal. In other states, such a court 
had authoritatively settled a vast number of questions — mooted in the 
English books — of practice and of statutory construction, so that a great 
deal of the labor of investigation was then limited to their own books. 
Not so in Georgia. Important cases were to be treated very much as 
cases of first impression ; and the whole field of the common law, her 
own statutes, and the books of the states, lay open fur exploration. It 
was true in Georgia, as indeed it is true before all enlightened courts, 
that success depended very much upon the industry of counsel. He 
who has the industry and talent to instruct the mind of the court as to 
what the law is, is most likely, as he ought to be, to prevail ^yith an 
honest and able judge. Judge Lumpkin's cotemporaries concede that 
he was an able lawyer — a fact which his elevation to the bench has 
made manifest. Yet it is true that he was considered by the world 
at large as being chiefly distinguished for his qualities as an advo- 
cate. There seems to be an uncharitable unwillingness in that same 
world to accord to one man great excellence in more than one 
intellectual department, and also a contrary disposition to magnify 
but small ability in a single department ; because, forsooth, the medi- 
ocre man pretends to no claim to anything else. We do not know but 
that the latter is the more common error. A dull dolt who, by years 
of plodding industry, attains (and creditably to himself) to some 
respectability as a lawyer, is incontinently hailed by a discriminating 
popular judgment as wonderfully profound — although, as to all other 
things in the vast range of human thought, he is as ignorant as a block 
of granite. Thus Lord Kenyon attained to the repute of being great, 
(and not without some claims to the distinction.) because he was the 
mere, not to say mechanical, champion and exponent of the dryest ti 

50 



786 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

ties of the common law. But the judgment of the wise and the good 
reverses the decision of the world, and holds not only that a man may 
be a good lawyer, and at the same time a scholar, a statesman and an 
orator, but that, all these must unite to make him really great; as in 
the case of Cicero, Mansfield, Webster, and Legare. Whether it be 
owing to this uncharitableness of the world, or, which is more likely, 
because the light of his eloquence eclipsed his legal acquirements — his 
reputation as an advocate was for a long time greater than his fame as 
a jurist. The grand array of planets and constellations is hid from the 
view when the sun is in the heavens, but they are none the less set in 
the firmament. If he was great as an orator, in the just sense of great- 
ness, he was variously great ; for it is as true now as when Cicero an- 
nounced it, that to be a great orator, one must be versed in the whole 
circle of science. With other knowledge, he must know man in the 
springs of his motives — in his social relations — in his dignity and his 
meanness — in his resemblance to a worm — in his similitude to a God; 
he must so know things — past and present — with such insight into 
the future, as to draw argument and illustration from every point in 
the circle of human history. We know few men who better answers 
to the Latin description of an orator — Vir bonus dicineri peritus — 
Probity lies at the foundation. This is the inspiring power, as well as 
the source of confidence. We yield to the arguments or the persuasions 
of a good man, because, from his virtuous character, we infer sincerity 
and protection against imposition. We know that all truth so commu- 
nicated as to reach the understanding, is eloquent — as a mathematical 
demonstration, a moral postulate, a sigh, a tear, or a single act. An 
instance of the last occurs to us in Lafayette's kissing the hand of the 
queen, before the Parisian mob. But goodness and love are the foun- 
dations of that strange power — that wonderful trust, which we call 
popular oratory. When these co-exist with knowledge and physical 
aptitude, the thing is perfect. Thus Carlyle : " Who ever saw, or will 
see, any true talent, not to speak of genius, the foundation of which is 
not goodness — love ?" It is not a momentary determination in favor of 
rightj.as simulated indignation at wrong, or an affection of the imagina- 
tion, but an abiding, ingrained rectitude of nature, and a real love — 
love of truth, beauty, nature, man and God. Rectitude of purpose and 
affectionate sympathy with the rights and wrongs, the wants and 
woes of humanity, cannot choose but show themselves. A true and 
loving nature embodies itself in words — in appropriate action — the fire 
of the eye — the warm, sweet melody of the voice — the speaking atti- 
tudes of the man. Pithily and truly has it been said — " The word 
a man speaks, that is the man." Christ was the word of God. The 
sources whence flow the streams of Judge Lumpkin's eloquence are, 
goodness, a fervent love of truth and justice, a clear perception of the 
beautiful in morals and in nature, and quick and gushing sensibility. 
To these are to be added what may be designated as the physical pro* 
perties — a strong constitution, a pleasing presence, expressive action, 
and a clear, deep, various-toned voice. His action is free and natural, 
■very often emphatic, and rarely otherwise than graceful. Prompted by 
the sentiment, it seems by a resistless sympathy to express that. In the 
heat of his discourse he does not hesitate for words ; they — the simple 



JOSEPH HENRY LUMPKIN, OF GEORGIA. 78 7 

and strong Anglo-Saxon words, appear to come without invocation, as 
part of a self-moving moral machinery. He deals more in illustrations 
than in figures. His distinguisbing physical property is the voice. 
That is very fine; its variety is great, and its bass notes, when breathed 
upon by the spirit within, possesses indescribable charms. It awakens 
sympathy, and strikes the heart as well as the ear. It comes forth 
baptized in sensibility. Mr. Clay's voice, in his prime, aptly likened to 
a band of instruments, was more remarkable for variety of tone, but not 
clearer or deeper, or otherwise expressive. We know not how more 
truthfully to characterize the style of his eloquence than by designating 
it as vehement, argumentative, combining the highest order of declama- 
tion with perspicuous and sound reasoning — that style which never fails 
to stimulate the mind to conviction, and to arouse the soul of sympathy. 
The late General McDuffie, of South Carolina, in the meridian of his 
day, was such a speaker, without his advantages of manner, person and 
voice. Had he lived in 1776, amid the sublime events and inspiring 
themes of the Revolution, he would have resembled Patrick Henry, 
both in his oratory and his love of liberty. It is, for example, the an- 
tagonist style of Mr. Everett's — so remarkable for its calm repose and 
elegant variety. Both are living streams bound to the deep sea. The 
one rushes onward like the arrowy Rhone, while the other meanders 
through vale and meadow, distributing verdure in its course. We close 
what we have space to say of Judge Lumpkin while at the bar, by 
adding, that in 1833, in conjunction with Governor Schley, and 
John A. Cuthbert, Esq., he was appointed to digest the penal code 
of Georgia, which commission was executed to the satisfaction of the 
legislature. The present code is the result of the labors of that com- 
mission. 

In 1845, the legislature organized the Supreme Court of Georgia. 
Twelve years previous, the constitution had been amended so as to au- 
thorize it. Previous to 1845, owing to some diversity of sentiment 
among able men as to the utility of such a court, and to great diversity 
of opinion as to the plan of its organization, but more especially 
because it had become complicated with the party issues of the day, it 
was found impossible to unite a majority of the legislature in its favor. 
In 1845, the whig party being in power, the present court was organ- 
ized, with a party understanding that two of the judges should be 
chosen from the whig party ; and the other and the reporter, from 
the democratic party. This understanding was in good faith carried 
out, and Judge Lumpkin, Judge Warner and Judge Nisbet were elect- 
ed ; Judge Lumpkin for the longest initiatory term: the tenure of office 
being, under the first election, six, four, and two years, and the permanent 
tenure of all for the term of six years. When the bill passed to organize 
the court, Judge Lumpkin was on his return from Europe. Without soli- 
citation on his part, indeed without a knowledge of the fact, his friends 
offered his name as a candidate for this bench, and he was without op- 
position chosen to the long term. The Supreme Court is now in its 
sixth year, having been from the beginning under the administration of 
the first incumbents. The labor and responsibility of putting into ope- 
ration and sustaining the Supreme Court of Georgia, under the circum- 
stances which attended its organization, cannot well be appreciated but 



•788 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

by those upon whom like labor and responsibility have fallen elsewhere 
Without stopping to dilate upon the court, it may be proper to say, 
that in the estimation of both its original friends and opponents, it has 
outlived opposition, and is firmly seated in the affections of the people. 
To what meed of praise these gentlemen are entitled, together and in- 
dividually, for this fortunate result, is for the enlightened community of 
Georgia, and more especially for the able bar of that state, to deter- 
mine. Judicial reputation is of slow growth. They may rest satisfied 
that time will make a just award, if the award be not, in fact, already 
made. Without being at liberty to speak now of his distinguished 
colleagues, this paper would be imperfect without referring, very briefly, 
to Judge Lumpkin's character as a judge. The object of all courts is 
the administration of yMs//ce, and those who minister at her altar should 
love her. To arrive at the right of a cause is Judge Lumpkin's earnest 
purpose, and his plan of arriving at it is to administer the law — the 
law as it is settled, and not as he would have it to be. He has expressed 
himself freely as to legal reform, frequently at large, in his report to 
the legislature of 1849. He believes that the common law ought to 
be changed so as to be adapted to the institutions of this country, the 
habits of the people, the expansion of commerce, the multiplication of 
corporations, and to the general progress of the age. As a citizen, 
doubtless, he would be a bold reformer ; but as a judge, he strictly 
abides the law. He has frequently from the bench denounced judicial 
legislation as the evil most to be deprecated ; and, while a stanch de- 
fender of the rights of the judiciary, particularly in its control over un- 
constitutional legislation, yet he has always declared his respect for, 
and his concession to, the law-making power. One will perceive, by 
recalling the numerous decisions of the Supreme Court upon the con- 
stitutionality of laws and the rights and obligations of corporations, 
that they are strictly conservative, adhering to the law as settled, ven- 
turing upon no experiments, but adhering to authority. He has, what 
every judge has not, a profound sense of the solemnity of judicial 
functions. He seems to feel what the common mind does not recognize, 
that no department of the government has so much to do with the 
rights of the people and their personal happiness as the judiciary. It is, 
in truth, the balance-wheel of the political machine. With such views, 
he brings to the discharge of his duties, labor, conscientiousness, and in- 
dependence. To illustrate his learning, not inferior to his most flivored 
cotemporaries, the length of this sketch, already too protracted, con- 
strains us to refer only to his opinions, to be found in the nine volumes 
of the Reports of the Supreme Court of Georgia. It is believed that 
they will compare well with those of any of the judges of the states. 
His mind is of the impulsive cast: it is, however, the impulsiveness of 
genius, not of passion, and he doubtless finds it necessary to restrain its 
rapidity of action, and subdue it to a habit of patient hearing and in- 
quiry. His quickness of perception is almost intuitive. He is now 
upon the theatre of distinguished usefulness. The bench will prove the 
foundation of his most excellent and most endearing reputation ; and 
we have no doubt but in the future of his life the retrospect of his judi- 
cial labors will be the source of his purest joys. 




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JOHN MCLEAN, OF OHIO. 789 

/ HON. JOHN McLean, 

JUSTICE OF THE SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES. 

A LOW, vaulted chamber, in the eastern basement of the capito], hav- 
ing no pretensions to architectural splendor and ornament, is the place 
where the supreme judicial department of the federal government 
has its local habitation. There is exercised an authority, bounded in 
its territorial extent only by the limits of the republic. It embraces 
among its subjects individuals, tribes, and sovereign states, the opera- 
tions of the state and federal governments in various departments and 
relations, and determines rights incident to peace and war. Its judges 
are called upon sometimes to administer the laws of nations, the laws 
of the federal republic, the laws of the several states, to expound na- 
tional treaties, and enforce private contracts. In the variety, import- 
ance, and majesty of its jurisdiction, and the wisdom and simplicity of 
its exercise, the Supreme Court of the United States has no parallel 
upon earth, and is without example in the history of the world. The 
stranger in Washington who comes into the presence of this tribunal, 
and witnesses the grave simplicity and wisdom that distinguishes Hs 
proceedings, feels a degree of respect and veneration inspired by no 
other department of the government. As with deep interest he looks 
upon the magistrates clothed with such high authority, his eye will 
rest upon the calm and dignified countenance of Mr. Justice McLean, 
who now sits in that chamber, the survivor of Marshall and Story, at 
the right hand of the Chief Justice, the senior judge in commission. 

A Judge of the Supreme Court of the United States, Postmaster- 
General, Commissioner of the General Land-Office, Member of Con- 
gress, a Judge of the Supreme Court of his own state — these important 
stations in the three departments of government, executive, legislative, 
and judicial, comprise the sphere of Judge McLean's public life. The 
manner in which they have been filled is distinguished by an ability 
equaled only by the integrity of his private life ; presenting a character 
useful and worthy of respect in its day and generation, extending by ex- 
ample its influence to all time. 

The history of such a life is the history of the country. In the brief 
space allotted for this sketch can only be traced in outline the path by 
which, from obscure youth and humble station. Judge McLean has at- 
tained the honors of his mature age. And it will thus be seen that, 
while such distinction is reached by few, the path to it in this repub- 
lican government is open to all ; that to his principles may be ascribed 
the usefulness and success of his life. 

" Lives of great men all remind us, 
We can make our lives sublime, 
And departing, leave behind us 
Foot-prints on the sands of time." 

In Morris county, New-Jersey, on the 11th of March, 1785, John 
McLean was born. Four years afterwards his father, in humble cir 



790 BKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS, 

cumstances, with a large family, removed to the western country ; 
settling for a short time, first at Morganstown, Virginia, afterwards on 
Jessamine, near the town of Nicholasville, Kentucky, from whence he 
removed, in 1793, to the neighborhood of Maysliclv, and finally, in 1799, 
to that part of the territory northwest of the Ohio Eiver, which now 
constitutes Warren county, Ohio. He settled upon and cleared a farm 
in this new country, where, for forty years, and until his death, he re- 
sided. His son afterwards owned, and for a long time resided upon, 
the homestead. The means of education in that country in those days 
were very limited, and, in the father's condition, the son could not be 
sent abroad to be educated ; but, being sent to school at an early age, 
he made great proficiency in the elementary branches of education. 
Laboring on the farm until sixteen years of age, he then received in- 
struction from the Reverend Matthew Wallace and ^Mr. Stubbs in the 
languages, with which, by their aid and diligent study, he became well 
acquainted ; — in the mean time, with generous independence, refusing to 
tax his father's limited means, he by his own labor maintained himself, 
and defrayed the expenses of his tuition. 

Ardent and aspiring, at an early age he resolved to pursue the legal 
profession. Animated with genuine ambition, dismayed by no difficul- 
ties, with firm and determined purpose confiding in his own virtue and 
industry to overcome all obstacles, he engaged, at the age of eighteen 
years, to write in the clerk's office of Hamilton county, in Cincinnati, 
in order to maintain himself by devoting a portion of his time each day 
to that labor, while pursuing the study of law under the direction of 
Arthur St. Clair, an eminent counselor, son of the distinguished general 
of that name, and who had been governor and judge of the Northwest 
Territory. While supporting himself, he thus acquired, in connection 
with the principles of legal science, a knowledge of the practical forms 
of his profession, the details of public business, and formed those me- 
thodical and diligent habits that proved of infinite service in his subse- 
quent career. In addition to his other employments he became a 
member, and took an active part in the discussions, of a debating so- 
ciety in Cincinnati, many of whose members have since attained distinc- 
tion in the public service. And it may well be doubted whether any 
mode of instruction more efficient could have been devised for the 
future lawyer, statesman and judge, than was diligently resorted to for 
three years by the young aspirant for his own improvement, and to 
overcome his straitened circumstances and secure his independence. 

In the spring of 1807, being then twenty-two years of age, Mr. 
McLean was married to a lady of amiable manners and great benevo- 
lence of character. Miss Rebecca Edwards, daughter of Dr. Edwards, 
formerly of South Carolina. She was for many years his devoted com- 
panion, sharing the struggles of his early life and the honors of his man- 
hood, in her own sphere presiding with judgment and discretion over 
the cares of a large family. 

In the fall of 1807, he was admitted to the bar ; and entering upon 
the practice of law at Lebanon, in Warren county, he soon found him- 
self in the enjoyment of public confidence, and in the receipt of ample 
professional emoluments. 

At the October election in 1812, becoming a candidate to represent 



JOHN MCLEAN, OF OHIO. 791 

in Congress his district, which then included the city of Cincinnati, after 
an animated contest with two competitors, he was elected by a large 
majority over both of the opposing candidates. The political princi- 
ples with which he entered public life, and the manner they were acted 
upon, in the high and responsible station to which he was now called, 
have been thus stated : " From his first entrance upon public life, John 
McLean was identified with the democratic party. He was an ardent 
supporter of the war, and of the administration of Mr. Madison, yet 
not a blind advocate of every measure proposed by Ihe party, as the 
journals of that period will show. His notes were all given in refer- 
ence to principle. The idea of supporting a dominant party, merely 
because it was dominant, did not influence his judgment, or withdraw 
him from the high path of duty which he had marked out for himself. 
He was well aware, that the association of individuals into parties, was 
sometimes absolutely necessary to the prosecution and accomplishment 
of any great public measure. This he supposed was sufficient to in- 
duce the members composing them, on any little diflference with the 
majority, to sacrifice their own judgment to that of the greater num- 
ber, and to distrust their own opinions when they were in contradiction 
to the general views of the party. But as party was thus to be re- 
garded as itself, only an instrument for the attainment of some great 
public good, the instrument should not be raised into greater importance 
than the end, nor any clear and undoubted principle of morality be 
violated for the sake of adherence to party. Mr. McLean often voted 
against political friends : yet so highly were both his integrity and judg- 
ment estimated, that no one of the democratic party separated himself 
from him on that account. Nor did his independent course in the 
smallest degree diminish the weight he had acquired among his own 
constituents." 

Among the measures supported by him, were the tax bills of the 
extra session at which he first entered Congress. He originated the 
law to indemnify individuals for property lost in the public service. A 
resolution instructing the proper committee to inquire into the expedi- 
ency of giving pensions to the widows of the officers and soldiers who 
had fallen in their country's service, was introduced by him ; and the 
measure was afterwards sanctioned by Congressional enactment. By 
an able speech he defended the war measures of the administration ; and 
by the diligent discharge of his duties in respect to the general welfare 
of the country, and the interests of his people and district, he continued 
to rise in public estimation. In 1814, he was re-elected to Congress 
by the unanimous vote of his district, receiving not only every vote 
cast in the district for representative, but every voter that attended the 
polls voted for him — a circumstance that has rarely occurred in the 
political history of any man. His position as a member of the com- 
mittee of foreign relations and of the public lands, indicates the estima- 
tion in which he was held, and his familiarity with the important ques- 
tions of foreign and domestic policy which were in agitation during the 
eventful period of his membership. The wide field for public usefulness 
presented by the representative branch of the national legislature, in- 
duced him to decline earnest solicitations to become a candidate for the 
United States Senate in 1815, at a time when his election was regarded 



792 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

as certain, although he had only attained his thirtieth year, and was 
therefore barely eligible. He remained in Congress until 181G, when 
the legislature of Ohio having unanimously elected him a judge of the 
Supreme Court of that state, he resigned his seat in Congress at the 
close of the session, and was succeeded as representative of that district 
by General Harrison. 

After his acceptance of the judgeship, and before his resignation, the 
famous compensation bill was reported, giving to each member of 
Congress a salary of fifteen hundred dollars a-year, in lieu of the per 
diem allowance then paid, which was supported by the judge and 
by the principal members of Congress of both political parties. He 
was on the committee that reported the bill ; and being convinced that 
it was a measure eminently calculated to advance the public service, 
he voted for it, believing that it would shorten the sessions of Con- 
gress, give it a more business character, and greatly lessen the public 
expenditure. Under this law, no useless discussions would have been 
tolerated, and the business before Congress would have been promptly 
dispatched. But the law was perverted, and its effects misrepresented 
by selfish aspirants, so that at the next session it was repealed, and 
the present Jaw, giving eight dollars per day, and eight dollars for 
every twenty miles travel, was passed. Under the salary system, few 
members would have consented to remain in session longer than was 
necessary to act on the business before them. The contingent ex- 
penses of Congress would have been one-third less than they now are, 
and the annual pay of the members would have been proportionably 
reduced : at the same time, they would have been better paid for 
the time spent in legislation. But the most desirable feature in the 
reform would have been found in the increasing dignity and business 
character of the body. 

Judge McLean remained six years upon the Supreme Bench of Ohio, 
serving the state with great advantage to its jurisprudence, and evincing 
those professional attainments and judicial qualities that have since 
distinguished his present station. In the summer of 1822, he was ap- 
pointed Commissioner of the General Land Office by President Monroe ; 
and in July, 1823, he became Postmaster-General. 

The administration of the General Post-Oflice, in the condition it then 
was, presented so little for an ambitious man of reputation to hope for, 
and so much to dread, that his friends earnestly endeavored to dissuade 
him from accepting the appointment. Disordered arrangements, de- 
pressed finances, arduous duties, public complaints and distrust, not 
unmingled with groundless abuse and calumny, presented a field where 
it was generally thought no reputation could be won. But confiding in 
his own industry and ability, and relying with confidence upon the 
virtue and intelligence of the people properly to estimate devotion to 
their service. Judge McLean resolved to undertake the hazard of the 
office. Order and economy enforced, finances improved and credit 
restored, regularity and dispatch of the mail, intercourse extended, and 
commercial correspondence carried on with ease, celerity, and security 
before unknown, soon manifested the application of his vigorous mind 
and methodical habits to the complicated affairs of the Post-office de- 
partment. Devoting his personal attention to all the details of busi- 



JOHN m'lEAN, of OHIO. 793 

ness, guarding against fraud and corruption in the making and execution 
of contracts, promptly dismissing unfaithful and inefficient contractors, 
agents, and postmasters, superintending all the correspondence, and 
acting upon all appointments and complaints, his administration of this 
department was rewarded with unexampled success and public confi- 
dence. By a nearly unanimous vote of the Senate and House, the Post- 
master-General's salary was increased from four to six thousand dol- 
lars. Those who from motives of policy opposed the measure, did so 
with reluctance; and John Randolph said the salary was for the officer 
and not for the office, and that he would vote for the bill if the law 
should be made to expire when Judge McLean left the office. 

The distribution of the public patronage of his department exhibited 
in another respect his qualities as an executive officer, and manifested 
the rule of action that has always marked his character. The principle 
upon which executive patronage should be distributed, has been one of 
the most important questions in this government, and has presented 
the widest variation between the profession and practice of individuals 
and parties. In the administration of the Post-office department by 
Judge McLean, an example was presented in strict consistence with 
sound principles of republican government, and just party organization. 
" During the whole time that the affairs of the department were ad- 
ministered by the judge, he had necessarily a difficult part to act. The 
country was divided into two great parties, animated by the most de- 
termined spirit of rivalry, and each bent on advancing itself to the lead 
of public affairs. A question was now started, whether it was proper 
to make political opinions the test of qualification for office. Such a 
principle had been occasionally acted upon during preceding periods of 
our history ; but so rarely, as to constitute the exception, rather than 
the rule. It had never become the settled and systematic course of 
conduct of any public officer. Doubtless every one is bound to concede 
something to the temper and opinions of the party to which he belongs, 
otherwise party would be an association without any connecting bond 
of alliance. But no man is permitted to infringe any one of the great 
rules of morality and justice, for the sake of subserving the interests 
of his party. It cannot be too often repeated, nor too strongly im- 
pressed upon the public men of America, that nothing is easier than 
to reconcile these two apparently conflicting views. The meaning of 
party, is an association of men for the purpose of advancing the public 
interests. Men thrown together indiscriminately, without any common 
bond of alliance, would be able to achieve nothing great and valuable; 
while united together, to lend each other mutual support and assistance, 
they are able to surmount the greatest obstacles, and to accomplish the 
most important ends. This is the true notion of party. It imports 
combined action ; but does not imply any departure from the great 
principles of truth and honesty. So long as the structure of the human 
mind is so varied in different individuals, there will always be a wide 
scope for dirersity of opinion as to public measures ; but no foundation 
is yet laid in the human mind for any material difference of opinion, as 
to what constitutes the great rule of justice. 

" The course which was pursued by Judge McLean, was marked by 
the greatest wisdom and moderation. Believing that every public 



Y94 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

officer holds his office in trust for the people, he determined to be in- 
fluenced by no other principle in the discharge of his public duties, 
than a faithful performance of the trust committed to him. No indi- 
vidual was removed from office by him, on account of his political 
opinions. In making jf^pointments where the claims and qualifications 
of persons were equal, and at the same time one was known to be 
friendly to the administration, he felt himself bound to appoint the one 
who was his friend. But when persons were recommended to office, it 
was not the practice to name, as a recommendation, that they had been 
or were warm supporters of the dominant power. In all such cases, 
the man who was believed to be the best qualified was selected by the 
department." 

Having illustrated his principles and character in private and pro- 
fessional life, in legislative, judicial and executive functions. Judge 
McLean was now called to exercise his capacity and attainments in the 
full maturity of their strength, in the highest judicial station. By the 
appointment of General Jackson in 1829, he was placed upon the Bench 
of the Supreme Court of the United States, having declined the War 
and Navy departments, which were tendered to him. The circumstances 
that accompanied this appointment evincing the confidential relations 
that existed between General Jackson and Judge McLean, notwithstand- 
ing their different sentiments upon some principles of public policy, 
are interesting and highly creditable to both parties. They have been 
thus related: 

" On the arrival of General Jackson, after his election to the presi- 
dency, and when he was about selecting the members of his cabinet. 
Judge McLean was sent for to ascertain whether he was willing to re- 
main at Washington. General Jackson having stated the object of the 
interview, the judge remarked, that he was desirous to explain the line 
of conduct he had hitherto pursued: observing, that the general might 
have received the impression from some of the public prints, that the 
Postmaster-General had used the patronage of his office for the purpose 
of advancing the general's election ; but he wished him to understand, 
that no such thing had been done — and that had he pursued such a 
course, he would deem himself unworthy of the President's confidence, 
or that of any other honorable man. But that he was bound in candor 
to say, should he remain in office, he would not deviate in any respect 
from the course he had pursued under Mr. Adams ; that in all he had 
done he ha(^ looked with a single eye to the public interest, and that 
the same motives would govern his future action ; that no power, 
which could be brought to bear upon him, would change his purpose. 
The general replied with warm expressions of regard and confidence, 
and wished him to remain in the post-office department. He at the 
same time expressed regret, that circumstances did not enable him to 
offer the judge the treasury department. The judge replied, that hav- 
ing held office under the late administration, he was delicately situated, 
and required no distinction in his organization ; that he would remain 
in the post-office department on the terms stated, or retire, as might be 
deemed proper." It was well here to remark, that the postmaster- 
general was not a member of the cabinet, until he was made so by 
General Jackson. Some of the personal friends of the judge, who had 



JOHN m'lEAN, of OHIO. 795 

been designated for the cabinet, fearing that his course in the post-office 
department might not harmonize with the one which the members of 
the cabinet felt themselves bound to take, had conversations with him 
on the subject : and finding his purpose not to be changed, a seat on the 
Supreme 13ench was offered to him, which he accepted, and to which he 
was immediately nominated. 

Judge McLean had received so large a share of public confidence in 
political life, and believing the people would sustain a public servant 
who honestly devoted his time and abilities to their service, that he 
left the department with great reluctance. He desired, above all things 
earthly, to see this great and glorious experiment of free government 
carried out in its true spirit. And this, he doubted not, would secure 
through all time to come, unbounded prosperity and happiness to those 
who were under its jurisdiction ; and that its moral power would so 
operate upon the civilized world, sooner or later, as to overturn the 
thrones of despotism, and introduce in every nation a national liberty. 

At the January term, 1830, Judge McLean entered upon his duties 
as a judge of the Supreme Court of the United States. There is, per- 
haps, no station which calls into exercise, to a greater degree, the high- 
est faculties of the human intellect. In that tribunal must be discussed 
not only points of judicial learning, but theoretic and practical ques- 
tions of art, science and government frequently arise, their decision 
involving the present and future rights and interests of citizens and of 
states, the prosperity of commerce, the extent of legislative and execu- 
tive powers, the stability of republican principles, and the progress of 
mankind towards peace and happiness. Judge McLean's eminent fit- 
ness for that station has been manifested by twenty-two years' service 
upon the Supreme Bench, in which period the jurisprudence of the 
country has been enriched by the diligent labors of his energetic and 
cultivated mind. By his early habits of labor and industry, his intel- 
lect was trained and his body inured to undergo exhaustion and fatigue 
greater than is imposed upon any other department of the government. 
Upon questions of commerce and constitutional law, his opinions have 
been distinguished ; evincing great powers of reasoning and investiga- 
tion, they manifest a clear perception of the principles upon which the 
federal government was established, a profound veneration of their wis- 
dom, and an inflexible firmness in their support. 

The duties of the judges of the Supreme Court requiring the exercise 
of their functions not only in term at the capitol, but in their respective 
circuits, they may exercise an important influence upon the bar and 
upon the character of state jurisprudence. In this respect the influence 
of Judge McLean has been sensibly felt. His courtesy and patient at- 
tention to counsel, the dignity of his demeanor, and the uprightness of 
his conduct upon the bench and in private life, observed by the law- 
yers assembled at the state capitals, and by intelligent jurors and wit- 
nesses, have afforded an example which, throughout his circuit, is held 
in high estimation. Some of his charges to grand juries in the crises of 
important events, are regarded as the most able and eloquent exposi- 
tions of the rights and duties of American citizens amongst themselves 
towards foreign nations and other states. The reports of .the Supreme 
Court of the United States, and the reports of his decisions upon the 



796 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

circuit, form a monument of judicial fame, for which the honors 
awarded to the chief magistrate of the republic would be a free ex- 
change. 

The honorary degree of Doctor of Laws has been conferred upon 
Judge McLean by Cambridge University, the Wesleyan University, 
and by several other colleges and institutions of learning in the western 
and southwestern states. 

In December, 1840, the judge suffered the severest affliction to which 
any man can be subjected, in the loss of the companion of his youth 
and the mother of his children. She died as she had lived, an example 
of virtue and the triumphs of religion. In 1843, he married Mrs. Sarah 
Bella Garrard, daughter of Israel Ludlow, Esq., one of the founders of 
Cincinnati, a lady extensively known and admired for the graces of 
her person, the charm of her manners, and the accomplishments of her 
refined and cultivated intellect. 

Judge McLean is tall and well-proportioned in person, his appear- 
ance indicating great vigor of body and intellectual energy. His habits 
of life have always been simple and unostentatious. Cheerful in tem- 
per, frank in manners, instructive and eloquent in conversation, he 
possesses, in rare degree, the faculty of inspiring confidence and warm 
attachment towards him in those who come within his influence, es- 
pecially in young members of the bar, towards whom his kindness and 
courtesy has always been extended. A professor of the Christian reli- 
gion, he has sought to regulate his public and private life in strict con- 
sistence with his faith ; by diligence, justice, and charity, showing forth 
the consistence of religious principles and profession with the duties of 
a citizen, a lawyer, a statesman and a judge. 



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SSrui ~ far BioaroBlujiaZ Sketches of JL-mmjmt ^mir-Uiins 



JOHN "W. EDMONDS, OF HTIW-YORK. V97 



JOHN W. EDMONDS, 

JUSTICE OF THE SUPREME COURT OF THE STATE OF NEW- YORK. 

The father of this distinguished jurist was born in the city of New- 
York, at what is now the corner of William and Liberty streets, on 
the 27th of August, 1760. When the war of the Revolution broke 
out, he was a student at college, in Rhode Island. He, however, im- 
mediately left his studies, and enlisted in the army as a private soldier. 
In various capacities he served during the whole war, having risen from 
the ranks to an ensigncy, and, finally, to an assistant commissary. He 
was at the battles of Monmouth, Yorktown, etc. On the establishment 
of peace, at the age of twenty-three, he started to seek his fortune, hav- 
ing nothing but a horse, saddle, bridle, two blankets, and a little conti- 
nental money. In 1784, during his wanderings, he arrived at the site 
of what is now the city of Hudson, then called Claverack Landing. 
There, as one of the few settlers, he opened a small store, in which busi- 
ness he was found by the emigrants from Nantucket and Martha's Vine- 
yard, who purchased the land, and laid the foundation of the city. He 
was at one time a member of the assembly, and high sheriff of the 
county ; and he continued in trade until the war of 1812, when he again 
entered the service of his country. He was soon appointed paymaster- 
general of the militia, in which office he continued for several years 
after the termination of the war. 

He died at Hudson, in 1826, and within a few years a beautiful 
monument has arisen in its graveyard, erected to his memory by his 
sons. His wife, the mother of the judge, was Lydia Worth, daughter 
of Thomas Worth, one of the first settlers of Hudson. She was a de- 
scendant of William Worth, who emigrated from Devonshire, England, 
in 1640, and settled in Nantucket. From this common stock have de- 
scended Major-General Worth, of the United States Army ; G. A. 
Worth, Esq., president of the New- York City Bank ; and the Olcott 
and Edmonds families. 

After the death of Gen. Edmonds, his widow resided chiefly with her 
Bon, the judge, until she died, on the 20th of November, 1841. She 
was a member of the Society of Friends, and instilled into her children 
many of the tenets of that respected sect, which have evidently in- 
fluenced their conduct through life. 

Judge Edmonds was born in the city of Hudson, on the 13th of 
March, 1799. His early education was at private schools, and at the 
academy at Hudson, where he prepared for college. In October, 1814, 
he entered the sophomore class of Williams College, Massachusetts, in 
company with John Birdsall, afterwards circuit judge of the eighth cir- 
cuit, and attorney-general of Texas. In 1815, he solicited his dismis- 
sal from the college, and entered Union College, at Schenectady, where 
he graduated in July, 1816. His share in the exercises of the com- 
mencement was the Fall of Poland. On leaving college, he began the 
study of the law, at Cooperstown, with George Monell, Esq., afterwards 



798 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

chief justice of Michigan, After remaining at that place about six 
months, he returned to Hudson, where he studied two years, in ths 
oflice of Monell & Van Buren. 

In the fall of 1819, he entered the office of Martin Van Buren, in 
Albany. He continued with the ex-president, residing in his family, 
until May, 1820, when he returned to Hudson, and entered upon the 
practice of the law. He continued at Hudson until his removal to 
New-York, in November. 1837. 

Inheriting the military disposition of his fathei-, we find the judge, at 
the age of nineteen, a lieutenant in the militia, which commission he 
held for about fifteen years, when he obtained the command of hisregi- 
ment. This office he resigned in 1828, on being appointed, by De 
Witt Clinton, recorder of Hudson. To this day, throughout the old 
county of Columbia, the judge is addressed as colonel, military honors 
appearing invariably to take precedence of all others. 

At an early age, he took an active part in politics, ranking himself 
as a democrat ; and the first vote he ever gave was fur Daniel D. 
Tompkins, when he ran for governor against De Witt Clinton. 

In 1830, the judge was elected by the democrats of Columbia to the 
Assembly, in which body he soon became a leading and influential 
member. 

In the fall of 1831, he was elected to the State Senate, receiving, in 
his district, an unprecedented majority of over 7,500 votes. 

In the legislature, he was remarked for the industry and energy 
which have been displayed since — insomuch that, in a " portrait," 
drawn of him by a political opponent, during the first year of his ser- 
vice in that body, it was said of him: "His legal acquirements are 
good, and, from the industry which he exhibits in the business of legis- 
lation, it may be safely judged, that when more advanced in years, he 
will be eminent in his profession. He speaks with fluency and cor- 
rectness, and there is a clearness in his language and a candor in his 
statements, which cause him to be listened to with attention." "He 
was formerly the editor of a newspaper in Hudson, and a violent and 
determined politician. But, from his present course, it would be sup- 
posed he had tempered his strong feelings, and as the hey-dey of his 
youth passes away, his judgment will, no doubt, prevail entirely over 
his feelings. If this should be the case, and he do not lose his praise- 
worthy industry, he must hereafter stand high among our distinguished 
men." 

The newspaper in which this sketch appeared has long since ceased to 
exist — its editor has been dead some time ; twenty years have elapsed 
since it was written, and the prophecy has been fulfilled. 

So great was this industry during that session, it has been com- 
puted that the reports written by him would fill a printed volume of 
600 octavo pages. The principal portion of this labor was bestowed 
in the appropriate duties of his position as chairman of the committee 
on canals. Yet he found time to devote to other topics. He was one 
of the select committee who reported in favor of abolishing imprison- 
ment for debt. He voted against the bill on that subject which finally 
passed the legislature, which he condemned as too complicated and arti- 
ficial, and as calculated to preserve imprisonment, in cases of debt, too 



JOHN W. EDMONDS, OF NEW- YORK. 799 

much ; and he advocated a system substantially the same as that 
which now prevails in this state under the Code of Procedure, in 
the mean time, and after twenty years' experience, the law which he op- 
posed, though not repealed in terms, has fallen into disuse, and given 
place to a more simple and more just system. 

There was, however, no part of his career in the assembly which 
attracted so much the attention of the public as his course in regard 
to the Bank of the United States. General Jackson had not then com- 
menced his war on that institution, which resulted, finally, in its over- 
throw, and agitated the nation in all its parts. Colonel Benton had, in- 
deed, in the United States Senate, made an assault upon the bank ; but 
there were very many in the then dominant party who considered that 
assault as very great heresy. It was under these circumstances, with a 
very decided democratic majority in the assembly of at least five to 
one, and when a motion to postpone the whole subject indefinitely had 
been defeated by barely a tie vote, that Judge E. threw himself into the 
front rank of the battle, and with characteristic energy carried it to a 
successful issue. 

The ensuing year he was elected to the Senate of the state, and in 
that body, though a new member, was placed at the head of the canal 
committee, and on the judiciary committee. In the former position 
he remained only one year, being then transferred to the head of 
the bank committee, where he remained until the end of his term, and 
served on the judiciary committee the whole of his senatorial term, 
which was then four years. In the Senate the same industry and deter- 
mination of character was displayed. 

It was shortly prior to the monetary revolution of 1837, and the 
whole population seemed to be mad in its race for banks and canals. 
Projects for building canals, involving a public debt of many millions 
of dollars, and applications for one or two hundred new banks at a 
time, and a consequent ruinous inflation of the paper currency of the 
state, were some of the measures on which he took a decided stand ; 
and it was often remarked that he was never defeated in any position 
he took on those subjects. The number of new banks that were cre- 
ated was very limited — not more than five or six at each of the three 
first years of his term, and none whatever in the last year. And in 
that year he introduced, matured, and successfully carried, a measure 
for infusing a greater amount of coin into common circulation. This 
was effected by the law prohibiting the issuing of bank-notes under the 
denomination of five dollars. The measure was violently resisted by 
the banks throughout the state ; and when the suspension of specie 
payments occurred in* 1837, they had influence enough with the legis- 
lature, aided by the distresses of the people, arising from other causes, 
to procure its repeal. Yet, even here the judge's sagacity was dis- 
played. His plan was to have the measure go into operation very 
slowly, and not fully, short of a period of six years. But, against his 
wishes, the legislature altered the time to eighteen months, and thus 
the law was made to operate with its greatest severity in the very 
midst of all the distress and embarrassment caused by the suspension 
of specie payments. There were not wanting men who were ready 
to take advantage of this state of things ; and thus a measure, which has 



800 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. ^ 

prevailed in England with great benefits for fifty years, has been denied 
to our people. 

Another measure connected with the monetary affairs of the state 
occurred about the same time. The war between Gen. Jackson and 
his party on the one side, and the United States Bank and the oppo- 
nents of the administration on the other, was raging at this time with 
great vehemence. It was believed by many of the leading politicians, 
and among them Judge E., that the bank was assaulting the business 
and prosperity of the state, in order to drive it from its position of 
hostility to it — a position which had gone a great way in sustaining 
Gen. Jackson in his policy on this subject. To arrest it, he introduced 
into the legislature a project for interposing the credit of the state, to 
sustain its interest in the contest. 

Some of the most eminent capitalists of the city of New- York visited 
the legislature, and proposed the creation of a mammoth local bank as 
an antagonist to the United States Bank. This was opposed and de- 
feated by Judge E. and his associates, and instead of it he proposed to 
borrow 80.000,000 on 'the credit of the state, and loan $2,000,000 to 
the state banks, and the residue to the farming interests, through local 
loan officers. 

A report, recommending that measure, and a bill to carry it into 
effect, drawn by him, were introduced into the assembly, and such a 
law was passed. 

It was always said by Mr. E., among the friends of the measure, that 
it would never be necessary to execute the law, and that its mere pas- 
sage would have the effect to put an end to the war on the monetary 
affairs of the state. This anticipation was fully and very speedily re- 
alized, and the law never went into effect. It was the subject, however, 
of very violent attacks from political opponents, and was defended by 
him, in the course of the ensuing summer, in a speech, characterized by 
great simplicity, directness, and research, and which was very widely 
circulated and read. 

There was another topic of general interest which arose during the 
judge's legislative career, and on which, characteristically, he took a 
decided stand. That was nullification and secession, growing out of 
South Carolina's opposition to the tariff laws. This state was very 
resolute in standing by Gen. Jackson on that occasion, and a report, 
said to have been from the pen of Mr. Van Buren, then vice-president 
elect, was introduced into the Senate, sustaining the policy of the ad- 
ministration, and denouncing the doctrines of nullification and secession as 
destructive of the Union. This report, when it came up for consideration, 
was very vehemently assailed by five or six of the strongest men in the 
senate, and was defended by Mr. E. alone. The contest lasted nearly 
a week, resulted in the triumphant adoption of the report, and placed 
New- York on high ground, on the side of the Union and its integrity. 

In the last year of his term Mr. E. was unanimously elected president 
of the senate; and then, at the close of his term, his health being very 
much impaired, he retired from the senate, declining a re-election, which 
was tendered him, in a district where his party were greatly predominant. 

The most of the ensuing two years he spent in traveling, to recruit his 
health. lie accepted a commission, from General Jackson, to visit the 



JOHN Vr. EDMONDS, OF NEW-TORK. 801 

Indian tribes on the borders of Lakes Huron and Superior, and was at 
one time in the interesting position of being encamped with over six 
thousand of the natives of the forest. His letters to his family, written 
during this sojourn, and which we have read, are very graphic and in- 
teresting, and give a very vivid picture of that Indian life which is so 
rapidly passing away from among us. 

In the fall of 1837, he resigned his station, and removed from Hudson 
to New-York, where he resumed the practice of law. He almost imme- 
diately found himself in an extensive and profitable business, among the 
merchant princes of the commercial emporium. 

In April, 1843, without any solicitation on his part, the judge was ap- 
pointed, by Gov. Bouck, an inspector of the state prison at Sing Sing. 
It was with much hesitation that he accepted this unthankful task. The 
labor was indeed herculean. Scarcely any discipline was maintained in 
the prison, and the female prisoners had the entire control of the officers, 
hundreds of the males were entirely idle, and the earnings fell short of 
the expenses by over $40,000. But within eighteen months a great 
change was effected, and the female portion of the prison was brought 
into complete subjection ; strict discipline was introduced and maintain- 
ed among the males, and the annual deficiency in the revenue was re- 
duced to less than a tenth part of the former sum. 

This task, however, was easy in comparison with a reform of a differ- 
ent character, which he sought to introduce. He found that, for more 
than fifteen years, the system of government which had prevailed in our 
state prisons, was one purely of force ; and where no sentiment was 
sought to be awakened in the breast of the prisoner but that of fear, and 
no duty exacted from him but that of implicit obedience. No instru- 
ment of punishment was used but the whip, which had the effect of 
arousing only the worst passions of both convicts and officers — a practice 
of abominable cruelty, long engrafted upon our penitentiary system — re- 
volting to humanity, and destructive to all hope of reforming the pri- 
soner. So thoroughly had it become engrafted, that the most experienced 
officers insisted that there was no other mode by which order could be 
kept. Besides, they found it was then so very easy to govern in that way. 

Passion, prejudice and selfishness, all combined to place obstacles in 
the way of this proposed reform, and its progress was very slow. Yet 
it steadily advanced, and when, in 1845, the judge resigned the office of 
inspector, his system was in the full tide of experiment. It has been 
continued by his successors to the present time. It has also been 
introduced into the state prisons of Auburn and Clinton, and is now the 
governing principle in all our state penitentiaries. With a view of 
carrying out this plan, in December, 1844, he instituted a " Prison 
Discipline Society," the object of which is the reform of prison govern- 
ment, and the aiding of prisoners, on their discharge, to lead honest 
lives. This society is in very successful operation, and enjoys a large 
share of public confidence. How great an amount of good can be ac- 
complished by a single philanthropic individual ! and for this one move- 
ment of the judge, how many poor wretches will rise up and call him 
blessed ! For this the tear of gratitude shall fall upon his grave, while 
angels proclaim, that " he who turneth one sinner from the error of his 
way, shall shine as the stars forever." " Man dies but not one of his 

51 



802 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

•acts ever dies. Each, perpetuated and prolonged by interminable re- 
•sults, affects some beings in every age to come." 

On the 18th of February, 1845, Mr. Edmonds received the appoint- 
ment of circuit judge of the first circuit, in the place of Judge Kent, who 
had resigned. That office he held until June, 1847, when he was elect- 
ed a judge of the Supreme Court. 

In the discharge of his duties as circuit judge, he was always fearless 
and independent, reminding us of the famous Matthew Hale. A most 
extraordinary instance of this was exhibited at the anti-rent trials in 
Columbia county, in September, 1845. The counsel employed in those 
trials, had been engaged in the same cases at the circuit in March pre- 
ceding, and had then manifested no little combativeness. They dis- 
played the same warmth before Judge Edmonds, and carried it so far 
as to come to blows in open court. The offenders were gentlemen of 
high standing, and personal friends of the judge, and both at once 
apologized for their contempt of court. But the judge, with great 
promptness, committed them both to prison, and adjourned his court, 
with the remark, that it was not his fault that the course of public 
justice was thus interrupted. Perhaps none regretted this momentary 
outbreak more than the parties themselves, whose manners in private 
life are courteous in the extreme. 

This event attracted a great deal of attention throughout the Union, 
and was noticed by European papers as "evidence of advancing civili- 
zation in America." The most gratifying feature of the case was, that 
it did not disturb the personal good feeling which had previously exist- 
ed between the parties engaged in it. 

Upon the organization of the judiciary, under the new state constitu- 
tion. Judge Edmonds was nominated for justice of the Supreme Court 
by the bar of New-York, and by the Tammany party, and was elected 
by an overwhelming majority. This result cannot but be gratifying, 
not only to him, but to the public, inasmuch as during his judgeship he 
had made several decisions that warred upon popular prejudice; and 
•immediately before his election he had, with others of the democratic 
party, protested against the admission of Texas into the Union, as emi- 
nently calculated to lead to a war with Mexico, and to perpetuate the 
extension of slavery. Subsequent events have justified the sagacity 
which marked that act, while the act itself has subjected the gentlemen 
engaged in it to much obloquy and censure from their political asso- 
ciates. This proceeding was, however, rebuked in his triumphant elec- 
tion by the public, who honored him for his independence of character. 

The complaint which was made of the celebrated author of the His- 
tory of the Common Law, that he did not decide with sufficient quick- 
ness, cannot be uttered against Judge E. With him there is no delay, 
no hesitation ; indeed, it is remarked by all, that he transacts a greater 
amount of business, in a given time, than any jurist who has ever been 
upon the bench in the city of New-York, But though his decisions are 
delivered with the greatest promptness, they are masterly specimens, 
exhibiting all the elegance and perspicuity of the most elaborated legal 
judgments. 

With the younger members of the bar. Judge E. is an especial favor- 
ite. He always receives them with words of kindness and encourage- 



JOHX W. EDMONDS, OF NKW-TORK. 803 

ment, and hears them with patience. By the rising generation of law- 
yers — those who must, in a score of years hence, be the masters of the 
field now occupied by their seniors — he will be long and affectionately 
remembered, and by some of their number, who will wield abler pens 
than ours, proper tributes will be paid to his superior virtues and abili- 
ties. What was said of Sir Matthew Hale is no less true of the jubge : 
" His conversation is affable and entertaining ; his eloquence easy and 
persuasive ; his temper w^arm, open, and generous ; he is affectionate 
to his family and sincere to his friends." 

The judge has one brother, Francis W., cashier of the Mechanics' 
Bank in New-York, and distinguished as an artist. He has also three 
sisters, two of whom reside in the State of New- York, and the third, 
the wife of Col. Webb, of the United States Army, is living in Illinois, 
The family of the judge consists of three daughters, two of whom are 
married. 




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LETTER FROM JUSTICE CATRON. 805 



. BIOGRAPHICAL LETTER FROM JUSTICE CATRON, 

OF THE SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES. 

Dear Sir, — Some days since I received your letter of the 15th in- 
stant, in which you express a desire to publish in your magazine a 
sketch of my life, with a portrait, <Szc. 

For your kindness and good opinion, be pleased to accept my thanks. 
I do not believe there is a man living who could give you any tolerable 
account of my early life, except myself; and when the incidents were 
narrated, they would only prove, what Campbell says of Lord Mans- 
field — that when he came up from Scotland to Westminister School on 
a Highland pony, the chances were a billion to one against his ever 
being Chief Justice : and I can safely say, that quite as many chances 
stood in the way of my being a Supreme judge, when of the same age, 
as was his Lordship at the time he wended his solitary way south, with 
his pony as his sole companion. Your readers would only learn that I 
had been reared on a farm, and been flogged through the common schools 
in Western Virginia and Kentucky, and then had had the advantages 
of such academies as the western country afforded ;* humble enough in all 
conscience, and where little else than Latin, and the lower mathematics, 
was added to the common school training; that with this amount of ac- 



* As I am one of the few who have any recollection left of these schools, it may 
not be out of place to give some account of them. They usually consisted of a single 
teacher, and he a clergyman, having occasionally an assistant. Six days in tho 
week were devoted to teaching; nor were the schools crowded with pupils. At 
the head of this description of teachers stood James Priestley, an Englishman, and 
nephew to Doctor Joseph Priestley. He first taught at Bairdstown. Kentucky : then 
at Danville, and concluded his labors at Nashville, Tennessee, wheie his academy 
was denominated Cumberland College. I believe he was an Eaton man. His 
scholars commenced and ended with the dead languages, in which this teacher 
greatly excelled. Other branches were taught of course ; but Latin was the great 
foundation laid in by his pupils ; in this they were trained as if in spans and yokes, 
for four years at the least. How it happened that he turned out so many good 
writers and speakers, I never could tell ; but certainly, for the number taught, both 
in Kentucky and Tennessee, tke proportion of successful men was remarkably 
great. 

Others followed the same plan. I was taught by the Rev. James Witherspoon, 
a Presbyterian clergyman, who had been a professor of languages. He also relied 
on the dead languages as the main basis of education ; was well qualified to teach 
them, and could have preached m Latin as well as English. A distinguished law- 
yer and fri^d advised me to study English well, and not waste so much time on that 
which he said all lawyers forgot very soon. It struck me as sound advice, and I 
named to my teacher that I wished to study the English grammar. He replied that 
the thing was unheard of; that to be a good Latin scholar was to be a good English 
one ; furthermore, that he had never opened an English grammar. But I insisted, 
and we commenced together with Murray's grammar and key. It took me some 
three weeks to memorize the necessary parts, and when the time came for an effort 
at parsing, I took it for granted that I was ahead of my teacher; but in this I found 
myself greatly mistaken. We had the edition of Murray from which he had re- 
jected the objective case. This, Mr. W. declared, was a mistake — saying Murray 



806 BKETCHKS OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

quired knowledge, I read history, novels, and poetry; grounded myself 
■well, as I thought, in Virginia politics ; that I read everything that came 
to hand as it came — Fielding, SmoUet, Sterne, Goldsmith, and up 
through Tom Paine, Hume and Gibbon. Everything, or nearly so, 
then to be had in the country, of history, ancient and modern, was read, 
and much of it, with a devouring appetite. Prester John, Peter the 
Hermit, Richard and Saladin, FalstafTand Frederick, were all jumbled 
up together. It is due, however, to say, that preparatory to taking up 
Biackstone, I carefully re-read Hume's History of England, with Smol- 
let's and Bisset's continuations ; Robertson's Charles the Fifth, and also 
Gibbon's Decline and Fall ; and made extensive notes on each, which I 
thought exceedingly valuable at the time. They were on large fools- 
cap, bound in pasteboard, and all told were, when packed on each other, 
two-thirds as high as a table : nor did I doubt that wy co7idensed Gib- 
bon would go forth one day to the world in print ; nor do I now re- 
member at what time it was used to kindle the office fire ; but this was 
its fate.* With my old friends. Pope, Shakspeare and Sterne, I had 
to act, as I have often done since with my snuff-box — hide them from 
myself. But just then the veritable History of New- York, by Diedrich 
Knickerbocker, made its appearance amongst us young men of the 
West, which I did not attempt to resist then, nor at any time after- 
wards. And it is well I did not, for the matchless humor of that pro- 
duction has stood me in hand many times before juries, who got into 
the dangerous mood of an inclination to cry, when the clear interest of 
my client was that they should laugh. Most lawyers know the immi- 



might as well have stricken out the corresponding accusative from the Latin gram- 
mar ; and he inserted the rejected case with his pen. When we set about parsing 
he had no difficulty whatever ; and showed the difference between the English and 
Latin structures of the respective languages with an ease wholly incomprehensible 
to me, then or since. And I am compelled to admit, that good English scholars 
may be made without reading English grammar ; but why it is so, I do not know. 
Certain it is, that Priestley's scholars were equal to any ever educated in the western 
country ; and he would as soon have thought of making "Paine's Age of Reason" 
a class-book as Murray's Grammar. 

Several of these schools were denominated colleges, but they were conducted 
alike, high and low. Some of our young mcE were sent to Princeton, Yale and 
Harvard, and returned with great prospects, as they and their friends supposed, but 
success did not attend them ; they were no match for those educated at home ; and 
parents were taught the important truth, that where a boy is expected to spend his 
after life, and to succeed as a man, there he should be educated — if it can be do»e ; 
so that a knowledge of men, and.the habits of the people among whom he is to live 
and act, may be acquired as his scholastic learning progresses. One educated 
abroad, may return with stringent ideas of a wise economy, and a well-stored mind 
from books ; his theories may be very good : but in nine instances among ten, he 
is a dissatisfied man, that complains of everything at home, and who finds a carping 
temper to be a sorry handmaid in the war of life. 

* All men of experience must be aware, that the style of banter indulged in here, 
means more than merely to amuse ; that its object is to present an attractive pic- 
ture of the means employed by a vigorous and ambitious youth to become an intel- 
ligent man under circumstances where he had to rely, for his course of reading and 
study, almost exclusively on his own judgment, unguidedby a single man of general 
reading and matured scholarship. Placed in his circumstances, few would have 
done better, or judged more wisely, and thousands would have done worse. He 
had to read much, to the end, of learning where to begin and how to study : nor 



LETTER FROM JUSTICE CATRON. 807 

nent peril a felon is in, when a jury begins to be sorrowful over his 
case, and when burglary, arson, robbery, forging bank-notes, or passing 
them, and several other crimes, not now amounting to much, were 
capital adroit shifts to evade the pithy sentence of " Sus. per Col.," 
were deemed allowable. 

The Bible, being the common reader of my early schools, of course I 
knew almost by memory. Of geography 1 learned more than most 
men, and know more now. With this confused mass of self taught 
knowledge, I commenced to read law in April, 1812, in the State of 
Tennessee. Up to this date, I had never been sick a day, or hour, and 
had a frame rarely excelled ; one that could bear ardent and rigorous 
application for sixteen hours in the day, and which was well tried for 
about four years at something like this rate. Late in 1815, 1 tried my 
chances at the bar,- and succeeded ; certainly in the main chance of get- 
ting fees ; but then 1 had a good deal of worldly experience, and availed 
myself of the cases in court, throughout a heavy circuit, of a retiring 
brother lawyer and friend who was elected to Congress. To his busi- 
ness I attended, taking the unpaid fees ; and as he had a side in almost 
every important cause, " I run from the score" at the start, and which 
my elder brethren liberally applied for a year or two. Having served 
a campaign under General Jackson, and brought home some army popu- 
larity, the legislature of Tennessee elected me attorney for the govern- 
ment in my circuit, when my law license had the sand on it. The 
courts were full of indictments for crimes, from murder down. Here 
I had to fight the battle, single and alone, and to work day and night. 
No man ever worked much harder, I think ; my circuit judge was an 



were his labors greatly wasted on this first confused effort. As his mind enlarged, 
and the prospect lighted up and widened, he discovered, day by day, that his knowl- 
edge was in confusion ; a compound of facts and fictions that needed systematic 
adjustment; that his books must be read over again in classes and each class by 
itself; beginning with the more solid, and concluding the regular and steady course 
with the lighter works : and in doing this, great advantage was derived from the 
first reading. A hundred pages as an ordinary task could be gone through in the 
day, with a review in the evening of leading portions on which the narrative was 
founded ; and then, too, the day's work was abridged on paper, when the mind was 
heated up to a high state of vigor, and the composition aided by an employment 
of the author's language and style, which naturally on that occasion excluded all 
others. Every reader of sound experience knows that so much cannot be accom- 
plished by any young man on first reading a book. 

Much has been said to the prejudice of Gibbon's History of the Decline and Fall 
of the Roman Empire, because of its supposed tendency to imbue the young mind 
with ideas of infidelity to the Christian religion. When I read this author twice, 
and after a fashion abridged his matter, my mind was as impressible as the wide do- 
main of new snow that now lies before me ; (*) I believed him to be the greatest his- 
torian of his nation, if not the first the world had produced. He had my unlimited 
confidence ; and yet, no one impression was made on me that he questioned the 
truths of Christianity ; and when, long after, I heard him charged with infidelity, 
and chapters of his history referred to, for evidence of the fact, these chapters were 
re-examined and studied, subject to the criticisms of clergymen who aided me ; and 
Btill I feel confident that Gibbon is only misunderstood — that his narrative of facts, 
detailing violent contests among the ancient Fathers, and in councils of the church, 
have been attributed to him as opinions of his own, which amounted to an infidel. 

(*) Written at the Capitol, 24th Dec, 1851. 



808 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

excellent criminal lawyer, and being partly Scotch, always stood firmly 
by the state, and leaned strongly against the culprit : so that I got on 
very well; but often with an arrogance that would have done credit to 
Castlereagh, for blundering in my law, certainly, if not bad grammar. 
Like his lordship, I was given to white waistcoats and small clothes, 
and drew pretty largely on the adventitious aids furnished by the 
tailor. 

The lawyers then traveled the circuit from county to county, usually 
of a Sunday. Each man that was well appointed, carried pistols and 
holsters, and a negro waiter with a large portmanteau behind him. All 
went on horseback. The pistols were carried, not to shoot thieves and 
robbers, but to fight each other, if by any chance a quarrel was hatched 
up, furnishing occasion for a duel, then a very favorite amusement and 
liberally indulged in — and the attorney-general for the circuit was ex- 
pected to be, and always was, prepared for such a contingency. He 
managed to keep from fighting, however. His equipments were of 
the best, with a led third horse now and then for the sake of parade. 
Many are the anecdotes I could furnish of nights on the roadside, at 
country taverns, where the corps of lawyers halted short of the county 
town, and made as free with whisky punch and empty bottles as did 
our Irish brethren at a Galway assize about the same time : noj- were 
games at cards overlooked. But the law of the circuit was, that no 
duel should come of a brawl on these occasions ; if any one happened 
to suffer from a smashed bottle, he took it and made up on the spot. 

One station 1 filled when at the bar, amounting to almost a mono- 
poly ; it was that of drawing bills of exception. As a writ of error 
lay in all cases, civil and criminal, on a refusal to grant a new trial, 
often the entire facts had to appear with the judge's charge on them. 
We then took few notes of evidence, having to do more in a day than 
could be done in a week, if all that witnesses said was tediously written 
out as the trial progressed. The trial being ended, then the exceptions 
were required at once ; perhaps on the last day of the term. The 
writing was always done at the bar, and in the confusion of business. 
So adroit did I become by constant practice, that I could for hours 
write down and detail what every witness had deposed, as little annoy- 
ed by bustle and noise as if entirely alone, being so utterly absorbed 
as not to know what was going on. But usually on ending the work, 
found a leg asleep, and sometimes came down, exceptions in hand, just 
when " please your honor" had come out on the sound leg, and a shift 
was made to the numb one. 

I defended in many criminal cases after I removed to Nashville ; was 
in the defence very generally in the commercial causes ; had much to 
do with chancery practice, and actions of ejectment, and was decid- 
edly famous for enforcing the seven years' act of limitations in real 
actions ; and, after divers defeats and rugged contests, had my revenge 
by entire success ; not so much because of any merit of mine, but for 
the controlling fact, that John Haywood was the leading judge in the 
Court of Errors, and who had been a champion on my side of the ques- 
tion for many years before he went on the bench ; and presently 
William L. Brown removed to Nashville, and he, too, was enthusiastic 
on the same side. This gentleman was of my own age, and by far the 



LETTER FROM JUSTICE CATRON. 809 

ablest legal debater then at the bar ; but his frame was too weak for 
his great volume of brain ; he fell into spasms by over-exertion, and 
died. 

These are rough details, that will do little credit to one in so grave a 
place as I now fill, and especially not in the cities at this day. In the 
days of Spencer, Kent and Thompson, they would have been under- 
stood ; they set out under similar auspices, and believed that vigor and 
practical sense came of circuit practice and experience. That 
the fortunes of such men as Jackson, Clay, Polk and Benton, and 
five hundred others in the West, depended on knowledge of men 
and things thus acquired, I personally know ; nor could John Mar- 
shall, William Pinkney, or Daniel Webster, have succeeded much 
without it. 

I went to Nashville, (where I have resided since) at the end of the 
year 1818. In March, 1819, the town and country were overwhelmed 
with misfortunes in trade, and a general bankruptcy, not known before 
or since in that country. By the end of that year, the courts had two 
thousand causes in them at the least, and I had more business than I 
could do in the town itself, and rarely left; it. My success, profession- 
ally, was all that could be desired, and I had far more character than I 
deserved, owing mainly to uncommon capacity for labor, and much 
ambition to excel competitors. The Nashville bar was at that time 
inferior to none in the United States in contests involving conflict- 
ing titles to lands ; and possessed uncommon ability in most depart- 
ments of their profession. The action of ejectment had drawn them 
there. 

In December, 1824, I was elected by the legislature one of the Su- 
preme Judges of the State, which office I held until 1836, having been 
then beaten and turned out on a new election, under the amended con- 
stitution adopted by Tennessee in that year. I had acted as Chief 
Justice for some six years before I was superseded. Of the Tennessee 
decisions, whilst I was on the bench, nothing need be said, as they are 
all reported in the volumes of Mr. Yerger. 

The old pastime of dueling was overthrown by striking a lawyer 
from the rolls, in the case of Smith vs. The State, (1 Yerg. 228,) in 
which I delivered the opinion, and set forth my circuit experience ; and 
for which homily to my brethren, I was scorched with many a racy 
sarcasm ; such as, that a sinner who had carried blank challenges in 
the crown of his hat, and slept with his pistols under his head, was a 
very proper man to turn saint and lecturer, to put down a vice he so 
well understood in all its bearings. But as we have not had a duel 
since, nor a challenge, so far as I know, I still wear the laurels coming 
of the good advice so unscrupulously set forth to my brethren. 

On the 4th of March, 1837, I was nominated to the Senate by Pre- 
sident Jackson as a Judge of the Supreme Court of the United States, 
where I have had some character as being familiar with the laws ap- 
plicable to cases involving conflicting titles to western and southern 
lands. 

As to my mode of speaking at the bar, I have no very exact recol- 
lection. It was not methodical, tolerably fluent, sometimes stormy, 



810 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

and often sarcastic, which habit cost me rather dear on one or two oc- 
casions. One thing I recollect very well, that, after being on the bench 
twelve years, and then attempting to speak in court, I was as much 
embarrassed as at the outset; and under an obvious necessity of 
learning the art over again, if I intended to employ it, which I never 
did. 

After I was a lawyer, and a successful one, I cast about me for a peF- 
manent place of residence, taking a range from New-Orleans to Balti- 
more, and Harrisburg, Pennsylvania ; and, in the end, sat down where 
I felt certain of success, where good fortune attended me, as it has 
throughout, from early manhood up. 

1 never was a candidate for any political place, nor held any office, 
except those above referred to, of solicitor and judge. For many years 
past, I could not have been elected to anything by the people. With 
the floating masses I had nothing in common : 1 punished many of them 
for crimes, and always severely. They feared and disliked me. Among 
the great mass of propei iy -owners, thousands have been alienated by 
decisions adverse to their interests. The losing party naturally dislikes 
the judge who decides against him, and his family and friends take 
sides; whereas, the party that wins, and all connected with him, pro- 
mulge aloud, that no judge, not corrupt, or a dunce, could have decided 
otherwise; and so it falls out that half of a neighborhood, for a single 
decision, turn enemies, and the other half do not stand by the judge as 
friends. This process will pervade a whole country in a dozen or 
twenty years, when, during the time, the same judge has made thousands 
of decisions affecting almost every interest and every influential family 
in the community. A judge may have great cogency and influence with 
very many of the most intelligent class ; but if he be a stern and un- 
quailing official, it is not in human nature that he should be a popular 
man ; so at least, has been my experience. 

I have entertained some ideas on legal training for the bar and bench 
that are perhaps peculiar, which I will state. The difficulty of under- 
standing the laws of England, as expounded by courts and stated by 
commentators, is not very great. Thus they presented themselves to 
my mind ; but in their application to the various transactions of life lies 
the trouble. He who best knows how most things are usually done, is 
best qualified to deal with the right and wrong about which men go to 
law, and to apply old principles to new circumstances ; and so he is the 
best judge of what a new statute means. To judge accurately of these, 
deep practical knowledge is by far more valuable than deep law learn- 
ing, necessary as both are to the lawyer. He who knows mere law, 
but is without common sense to comprehend the facts to which his law 
may be applied, is a sheer pedant in his profession ; and therefore it 
is, that we so often find a walking index of .a lawyer not equal, as a 
judge, to a vigorous county court magistrate who never read a law- 
book. But force a young lawyer to battle his way up on the circuit ; 
to go and see the land surveyed, and the comer trees blocked before he 
tries his ejectment; to go into the workshop, or steamboat, or counting- 
house, and see how the thing is done his client is lawing about, and he 
will beat a dozen of his equals in capacity, crammed with law to the 



LETTER FROM JUSTICE CATRON. 811 

throat. Many instances of the kind have I witnessed. On one occa- 
sion, when just beginning, I said to a really great advocate: "Why, 
Mr. G., how in the world do you intend to get along iu this dreadful 
case of murder ; you have not even a law brief prepared ?" " Well," said 
he, " what book is Mr. Attorney -General going to rely on to prove it 
murder 1" " Mainly on Espinasse, Bacon, and Hawkins, I think," said 
I. "Ah, yes," was the reply, "I'll find enough, just above or just be- 
low, for my purpose, I warrant you," And so he did ; and acquitted 
his client, who ought, undoubtedly, to have been hanged. This was 
one of the very best drilled circuit lawyers I ever knew. He first 
studied and comprehended all the facts and motives involved in his 
case, and then thought over how society appreciated them ; and lastly, 
searched for law to sustain the case his facts made. And pretty much 
like him were Pendleton, Marshall, Spencer and Parsons ; and we have 
many such among us now, (a little spoiled by love of parade,) who com- 
bine that common sense rough training has taught, with a deep knowl- 
edge of law. 

I insist on thorough legal training and constant study ; but object, 
whether it comes from the bar or bench, to piles of references and 
figures, formidable as a treasury report, gathered from the index, and 
having no value in the particular case ; and which parade of authorities 
is notoriously an address of vanityto ignorance and pedantry, that ever 
reminds one of two grains of wheat smothered under two bushels of 
chaff; such being the plain condition of the little law that is applicable. 
How slow we all are, in such cases, to find out how merry our brothers 
make themselves at our expense, is marvellous. No doubt, I have been 
a common sufferer, as I often deserved to be when at the bar, and 
especially, since I have acted as judge. The practice deserves ridicule, 
and gets its full share. 

I could quite readily have had these few and trifling materials 
changed into the form of an ordinary memoir, and put in the third per- 
son, presenting an appearance (but nothing more) that some other hand 
than my own had done the work. This manner, however, is so stale, 
as to deceive nobody ; certainly not my own profession ; and therefore, 
I thought it fairer to write you a letter and risk the charge of egotism, 
for which I care not much ; whereas, I should badly wince at a charge 
of having resorted to the shabby contrivance, and of an attempt to skulk 
behind it, if mendacity or boasting was alleged. If such thing should 
happen here, the critic would allow that the author stands confessed in 
the singular pronoun, abundantly often for all purposes of recognition 
and responsibility. 

In conclusion, sir, permit me to say, that for several days after I re* 
ceived your letter, no intention existed of complying with your 
request; but on consulting with my brother-judge of your circuit, 
he insisted that the object of your magazine required a different course. 
To procure another to write for me, was not possible within the period 
limited by your letter, as no one knew much about me, short of my 
residence in Tennessee; and then the idea that a lawyer practising be- 
fore me, and an intimate friend, should sit down and coolly and truly 
discuss my conduct for thirty years, and my character and capacity, 
could not be entertained for a moment. Such a memoir could hardly 



812 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

be more reliable than an epitaph, or an eulogy, over the recent dead. 
I therefore threw off the foregoing slight sketches, which, with my vigor- 
ous memory of past incidents, cost me not much trouble, and little time. 
The matter may be readable, if not instructive ; nor will it indicate 
anything that is not true. 

Most respectfully, 

Your obedient servant, 

J. Catron. 
Washington, Dec. 24. 1851. 




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ROBERT C. DRIER, OF PENNSYLVANIA. 813 



^HON. ROBERT C. GRIER, 

JUSTICE OF THE SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES. 

The life of a professional or literary man seldom exhibits any of 
those striiiing incidents that seize upon public feeling, and fix attention 
upon himself. His character is generally made up of the aggregate of 
the qualities and qualifications he may possess, as these may be elicited 
by the exercise of the duties of his vocation, or the particular profes- 
sion to which he may belong. The subject of this brief notice may 
not form an exception to this general rule. His life has been one of 
hard study from his youth, and, since maturity, of laborious profes- 
sional duty in the several relations in -which he has been placed ; and 
the high place to which he has attained is evidence that these qualities 
afford the means of distinction under a system of government in which 
the places of honor are open to all who may be found worthy of them. 

Robert Cooper, Grier was bom March 5th, 1794, in Cumberland 
county, Pennsylvania, where his father, the Rev. Isaac Grier, at that 
time resided : his mother was the daughter of the Rev. Robert Cooper, 
of the same county, both of the Presbyterian Church. His father re- 
moved from Cumberland to Lycoming county, in the same state, in 
the fall of 1794, where he bought a farm, and built a house on it, a lit- 
tle below the mouth of Pine Creek, on the west bank of the Susque- 
hanna River. While resident there, he preached to three congregations 
for a very small compensation, deriving the means of his support 
mainly from a grammar-school which he taught, and the proceeds of 
his farm. He was a very superior Greek and Latin scholar, and every 
way competent as an instructor in those languages. And his amiable 
and excellent character, his benevolence and faithfulness as a pastor, 
gained for him the affections of all who knew him. Few men in a 
like sphere have been more beloved ; and the many excellencies of the 
father's character were not lost upon the son. The latter, at the age 
of six years, began to learn Latin under the instructions of his father, 
and, by the time he had reached his twelfth year, had mastered the 
usual course of Latin and Greek as they were then taught in ordinary 
schools. He continued his studies, under his father's direction, till 
1811, when he went to Dickenson College, and entered the junior class 
half advanced. In the mean time, in 1806 his father had removed to 
Northumberland, Pa., having been invited to take charge of the acad- 
emy at that place ; and there also he served three congregations in 
his capacity of clergyman, but supporting his family mainly, as formerly, 
by the revenue derived from his labors as a teacher. His method 
of conducting the academy did honor to his talents. It grew under his 
care into a highly respectable establishment, and obtained a high char- 
acter in that district of country. This reputation, and the thorough- 
ness of the course of instruction pursued, was the means of elevating the 
academy into a college, under an ample charter, with power to confer 
degrees in the usual form in like institutions. This enlargement called 



814 SKETCHES OF EMIKEKT AMERICANS. 

for more of the machinery of education than the institution had before 
possessed ; and the library of a celebrated professor, who had lived the 
latter part of his life in Northumberland, and not long before had died 
there, together with his philosophical apparatus, were procured for the 
college. 

In the meantime, the subject of this notice continued at Dickenson 
College. His aptitude for the languages and early instruction had 
' placed him far ahead of all competitors in that branch. He was so 
thoroughly master of the Latin that he could write it with facility, per- 
haps as well as his mother tongue ; and, though indifferent to, and never 
troubling himself about, college honors, his superior ability and acquire- 
ments were not questioned. His instructor in chem-istry was Doctor 
Cooper, formerly a judge in the interior of Pennsylvania, then Professor 
of Chemistry in Dickenson College, and afterwards President of Co- 
lumbia College, South Carolina, whither he had been invited by the 
state, and known throughout the country for his extensive literary and 
scientific attainments, and with whom our student was always a favorite. 
He graduated at Dickenson in 1812, but taught grammar-school in the 
college till 1813, when he returned to Northumberland to aid his father 
in his college duties, now become onerous by the addition of numerous 
students, and the increasing duties of the enlarged institution. 

Shortly after this, his father's health began to fail. He became dys- 
peptic, and this disease continued to enfeeble and distress him up to the 
period of his death, which occurred in 1815. And few men have lived 
more beloved, or died more lamented. 

His virtues and many excellencies of character did not perish ; they 
left their impress long on the community in which he had lived, and 
have descended upon his son — a goodly inheritance, and one that passeth 
not away. 

The well-known acquirements of the son pointed to him, young as 
he then was, (not twenty years of age,) as the successor of the father, 
and he was accordingly, soon after the death of the former, appointed 
principal of the college ; and in this new situation the extent and 
variety of his duties go to show how much may be accomplished 
where resolution and will are combined with ability. He graduated the 
classes, delivered lectures on chemistry, taught astronomy and mathe- 
matics, Greek and Latin, and studied law, all at the same time. 

His law instructor was Charles Hall, Esq., late of Sunbury, Northum- 
berland county, a gentleman eminent in the profession, under whom he 
was admitted to the bar in 1817, and commenced practice the same 
year. 

His professional career, which has since proved so successful, com- 
menced in Bloomsburg, Columbia county, Pennsylvania. There he 
continued, however, but a short time, for we find him settled in Dan- 
ville, in the same county, in 1818. Here his practice rapidly increased, 
and was soon extended to four or five of the surrounding counties, and 
there he continued till he was appointed, by Governor Wolf, President 
Judge of the District Court of Alleghany county. 

And here it may not be improper to state certaia events, very well 
known and justly appreciated in the place and neighborhood where they 
took place, and which evince the excellent qualities of heart of the sub- 



ROBERT C. GRIER, OF PENNSYLVANIA. 815 

ject of our note. At his father's death, he found hinnself the oldest of 
many brothers and sisters, including himself, eleven in number, most of 
them young and helpless; and they, together with his widowed mother, 
were entirely dependent upon him for their support. Well and faith- 
fully did he perform the duties that this condition of things called for. 
He possessed but little of this world's goods, but he had health, energy, 
talent, and a profession ; but he bent himself to the task, and with these 
materials, fairly brought into requisition under the guidance of a sound 
and affectionate heart and a willing mind, he overcame all difficulty. 
His brothers were well and liberally educated, and settled in business 
or professions. His sisters lived with him till they were married ; and 
his mother, till she died. As a son and brother, as well as in all sub- 
sequently formed domestic relations, he has been distinguished by the 
kindest and tenderest affections ; and no man is more beloved by his 
family and friends. If it be true that the recollection of kind and benevo- 
lent actions warms the heart into peace with itself, then may our friend 
well rejoice in the past, and look to the future in the thankfulness of hope. 

But to our narrative. His brothers and sisters being all married and 
settled in life, he had leisure to look out for himself; and in the year 
1829, he married Miss Isabella Rose, the daughter of John Rose, Esq., 
a native of Scotland, who emigrated to this country in 1798. Mr. Rose 
had been admitted to the bar in Europe, but never practised, or sought 
practice here. He was a gentleman of education and accomplishments, 
and possessed of considerable estate. He bought a beautifully-situated 
farm on the banks of the Lycoming Creek, about two miles above 
Williamsport, in Lycoming county, upon which he resided till his death, 
and which now belongs to Judge Grier, This stream is celebrated for 
the fine trout with which it abounds, some distance from its mouth. 
And this we mention more particularly, as the judge makes an annual 
excursion to his farm and fishing-ground, to enjoy his favorite vocation 
of trout-fishing. He early became a disciple of Isaac Walton, and is 
faithful to his preceptor to this day. Nothing is suffered to interfere 
with this excursion: and when the month of June arrives, he is sure 
to find his M'ay to the creek, with a few select companions, and all the 
necessary apparatus for catching and cooking his favorite fish, together 
with all manner of generous accompaniments to give zest to the luxury. 
This fishing-ground is in the midst of the eastern ridges of the Alle- 
ghany Mountains, into which the stream penetrates, and is surrounded 
with dense forests in their primitive state. The invigorating air of the 
woods, the beauty and wildness of the scenery, contrasted with that to 
which he is accustomed, the continued exercise and pleasure of the 
sport, sometimes not without adventure, all have their charm. And 
the judge returns to his professional duties, somewhat sunburned and 
weatherbeaten, to be sure, but with recovered powers, renovated frame, 
and clear head, ready for another year of labor. 

His appointment to the District Court of Alleghany county was made 
May 4th, 1838. He removed to Pittsburgh in October of the same 
year, and resided in Alleghany City till September, 1848, when he re- 
moved to Philadelphia, where he continues to reside. 

On the 4th of August, 1846, he was nominated, by President Polk, 
one of the Justices of the Supreme Court of the United States, in the 



816 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

place of Judge Baldwin, deceased, and was unanimously confirmed by 
the Senate the next day. 

The professional career of Judge Grier, while at the bar, was marked 
by high integrity of purpose, and fidelity to his client, qualities not un- 
usual in the profession ; but with him there was a benevolence not so 
universal, and generosity towards those who sought his services with but 
limited means of remuneration, that procured him many clients of this 
description ; and for many has he gone through with repeated and ardu- 
ous conflicts, without money and without price. 

In the conducting of his case, he was not apt to trouble himself much 
about its mere technicalities, and despised all the tricks and catches of 
the law ; he regarded mainly the principles involved in it, and arguing 
it upon this basis, his views were clear and logical, and always deliver- 
ed with great distinctness and force. 

While presiding in the District Court at Pittsburgh, he had the con- 
fidence of all the bar, which was one of the ablest in the state. There 
was a deference paid to his decisions highly honorable, and an attach- 
ment to himself personally, not often found to exist in the same degree 
between the bar and the bench. If the cause before him had merits, 
its advocate had nothing to fear; if doubtfal, he was sure of a fair and 
candid hearing ; but if without merits, or if tinctured with fraud, it be- 
hooved him to take care of his case, for he was sure of neither aid nor 
quarter from the court. 

With the jury, his charge was everything : they had entire confidence 
in his integrity and learning, and knew that he only aimed to arrive at 
justice. Their verdict was responsive to his instructions. And when 
exception was taken to his charge or opinion, nothing was withheld by 
selfish regard to pride of opinion, or petty doubt as to the unnecessary 
action of a higher tribunal. His view of the law was fairly stated, and 
sent up as delivered, without addition or diminution, upon its own 
merits to stand or fall. All men are liable to err, but he who feels the 
consciousness of power within himself, fears not, but rather desires the 
examination of his opinions by those who may have the power, together 
with the responsibility, of sustaining or reversing them. Every judicial 
opinion affects the property, the reputation, or the person of some one, 
to a greater or less extent ; and a faithful judge would rather rejoice in 
the detection of his error, than that it should be suflfered to exist to the 
injury of another. 

Since the elevation of Judge Grier to the Supreme Court, his judicial 
reputation has become the common property of the country, and is well 
established. His discussions bear testimony to this, and these are in 
the hands of every professional man. They disclose extensive learning 
and research, and a persevering seeking of the principle lying at the 
basis of the particular point under discussion — and this discovered, it 
is never lost sight of; and the conclusion arrived at is pronounced with 
the boldness of a fearless spirit, regardless of all consequences, save the 
one aim of bringing the truth to light, and giving effect to the law. His 
argument will stand the test of strict scrutiny ; is clear in its statements 
and details, marked, perhaps, more by the qualities of common-sense, 
clearness and strength, than by any effort after ornament, though by no 
means deficient in illustration, which is readily supplied by h s well- 



ROBERT C. GRIER, OF PENNSYLVANIA. 817 

stored mind. The works which contain the evidence of Judge Grier's 
judicial reputation are accessible to every one — an examination of these 
would swell this notice far beyond the limits assigned to it, and would 
require more time and ability than the writer has to bestow. He leaves 
it, therefore, to abler hands. 

His elevation to the distinguished place he now holds, has worked no 
alteration in the man. The same modest worth that marked his youth 
and maturity, continues to adorn his riper years. The same kindness 
of disposition to all, the same attachment to friends, and affection for 
those dependent upon him : a lover of his country, and, of the very ne- 
cessity of his nature, a religious man, and therefore a Christian — long a 
member of the church in the principles of which he was educated, and 
some time participating in its government — but liberal in his views, re- 
garding the spirit rather than the letter of his creed. Happy in his 
domestic relations, in the affections of an amiable and excellent wife, in 
the love of his children, in the attachment of his many friends, and 
highly honored, as he is, by his country ■ — his life affords an example of 
the triumph of right principles, unshrinking integrity, persevering indus- 
try, and fidelity to truth and to himself, over difficulties of formidable 
character, and from which a mind of less energy would have shrunk. 

" Heaven does with us as we with torches do, 
Not light them for ourselves : for if our virtues 
Did not po forth of us, 'twere all the same 
As if we had them not." 



52 



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SIMEON NEWTON DEXTER, OF NEW-YORK. 8 1 9 

SIMEON NEWTON DEXTER, 

OF WHITESTOWN, NEW-YORK. 

The men most influential in promoting the advancement of society, 
and in giving character to the times in which they live, are of two 
classes : they are the men of study, and the men of action. Whether 
we are more indebted for the improvements of the age to the one class 
or the other, is a question that allows honest difference of opinion. 
Neither class could be spared, and both should be encouraged to occupy 
their several spheres of labor and influence, zealously and without mu- 
tual distrust. 

The manrof study is sometimes stigmatized as an idler. The very 
intenseness of his devotion to books and scientific pursuits may bring 
upon him reproach from those who would measure a man's usefulness 
by his noisefulness. The invention of the cotton-gin is due to the closet 
meditations and experiments of a graduate from Yale College, who had 
gone South for the purpose of teaching a family school. " If it should 
be asserted," said an eminent judge, " that the benefits of this invention 
exceed one hundred millions of dollars, the assertion could be proved 
by accurate calculation." Yet, Whitney was laughed at, before his ma- 
chine was completed, as a visionary experimenter, and after its comple- 
tion it was stolen from him by a mob. It was not until they were 
compelled to it by expensive lawsuits that the southern planters recog- 
nized their indebtedness to the man of study. 

Science and research are seldom reluctant to acknowledge their obli- 
gations to enterprise and capital. Men of study well understand that 
their chosen pursuits are so abstract and engrossing as to partially unfit 
them for great successes in what is commonly styled practical life. They 
are apt to shrink from those rugged encounters with the world which 
are essential to the carrying on of large business enterprises. They are 
happy to analyze a soil or an ore, but prefer that the analysis should be 
practically applied by the farmer and the miner. They also want funds 
for the purchase of books and other instruments of study. They feel 
justified in saying to the men of wealth, " Give us of your abundance. 
We have helped you to become rich. Now help us in the pursuit of 
our studies, and we will tell you how your fortunes may be doubled. 
We will find new bed? of ore for you, and better methods for extracting 
the metal. We will invent new machinery for quickening and cheap- 
ening the processes of manufacture. We will discover ways of travers 
ing land and water with greater safety and expedition. We will em- 
balm the brilliant triumphs of warriors, and the more honorable achieve- 
ments of peaceful enterprise, in befitting history. We will spend our 
studious days in the service of humanity. We only ask, in return, a 
comfortable support and a suitable remembrance." 

The number of business-men now living who practically recognize the 
claims of science and study, is large and fast increasing. The list is 
headed by such munificent patrons of learning as Amos Lawrence, Ab- 



820 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

bott Lawrence, and Samuel Williston, of Massachusetts. It is a pleasant- 
thought that the worldly prosperity of these men seems to be only in- 
creased by their liberality to men of study and to scientific institutions. 
To the men of this class belongs the subject of this sketch. 

Simeon Newton Dexter, the third son of Andrew and Mary Newton 
Dexter, was born in Providence, R. I., May 11, 1785. The Dexter 
family were early settlers in the vicinity of Boston, near the Mystic 
River. Their descendants still reside on the old farm, the title to which 
was purchased from the Indians. They were of the Puritan stock, and 
have never brought reproach upon their cognomen. With this, the 
ideas of talent, enterprise, integrity, and social worth, have been long 
associated both in Rhode Island and Massachusetts. 

Among those who have added lustre to the name may be mentioned 
the Rev. Samuel Dexter, who was graduated from Harvard College in 
1720 ; was pastor of the Congregational Church in Maiden, Mass., and 
died in 1775. His son, Samuel Dexter, was an eminen* importing 
merchant in Boston before the Revolutionary War. He acquired a 
handsome estate, and at his death, in 181 1, bequeathed $5000 to Harvard 
College for endowing a lectureship of biblical literature, of which the 
Rev. George R. Noyes, D. D., is the present incumbent. 

The sons of Samuel Dexter, the importer, were Andrew, the fathei 
of S. Newton Dexter, and Samuel. Andrew engaged in the dry-goods 
business with his cousin, Andrew Brimmer, in Boston, where his two 
elder sons were born. Afterwards he removed to Providence, and 
commenced the manufacture of cotton goods in partnership with Lewis 
Peck. This was probably the first attempt, in this country, to manu 
facture cotton goods by machinery. It was considered a wild experi- 
ment. So strongly was Mr. Dexter opposed by his father and friends 
in the prosecution of this enterprise, that he finally sold out to Almy & 
Brown and Samuel Slater. The latter had recently arrived in this 
country. The general impression that these latter gentlemen were the 
first to manufacture cotton goods in the United States is erroneous. In 
the published life of Slater, there is a copy of the original bill of sale, 
by which Andrew Dexter and Lewis Peck disposed of their machinery 
to Samuel Slater. A fac-simile of the receipt is given, with signatures 
appended. 

Samuel Dexter, the brother of Andrew and uncle of S. Newton, was 
graduated from Harvard College in 1781, with its highest honors. 
Soon after his admission to the bar, he was elected to the Legislature of 
Massachusetts. Afterwards, he was transferred to Congress as a re- 
presentative, and finally to the national Senate. By the force of his 
talents, his probity and enlightened statesmanship, he gained much influ- 
ence and honor in Congress. He was twice invited by President 
Adams to a seat in his cabinet ; first, as secretary of the war depart- 
ment, and afterwards as secretary of the treasury. The duties of both 
these offices were discharged in a masterly manner. Daniel Webster 
opened his law-office in Boston about the time Mr. Dexter died. With 
the exception of Theophilus Parsons, afterwards Chief-Justice of the 
Supreme Court of Massachusetts, he was without a rival at the bar of 
that city, or before the Supreme Court at Washington. While visit- 
ing his relatives at Athens, New- York, he fell sick, and died May 



SIMEON NEWTON DEXTER, OF NEW-YORK. 821 

4, 1816. The sketch of his life and character, by Judge Story, belongs 
to the periiianent literature of our country. 

At the age of thirteen, S. Newton Dexter removed, with his father's 
family, from Providence, to a large and beautiful farm in Mendon, Mas- 
sachusetts. Here he lived about three years, and fitted for college un- 
der the instruction of the Rev. Caleb Alexander, who had charge of the 
congregational church in that place, and eked out his salary of about 
$200 per annum by keeping a classical school. It is an interesting 
fact that Mr. Alexander afterwards removed to Oneida county, New- 
York, and distmguished him.self by his efficient industry in soliciting 
funds and procuring a charter for Hamilton College. Little, probably, 
did the good pastor think that among his boys in the Mendon School 
was one who would afterwards become a liberal benefactor and trustee 
to an important literary institution of which he was himself to assist 
in laying the foundations. 

It was the earnest wish of his parents that young Dexter should en- 
ter college, and after graduation study a profession. His own tastes 
and feelings were averse from this course. His preference was 
strong for an active life. Already he so far understood his own tem- 
perament and talent as to judge himself more likely to be successful 
and contented in the thronged avenues of business than in the quiet 
walks of study. 

His wishes were yielded to; and, at the age of seventeen, Mr. Dex- 
ter entered the store of William Clapp, a wholesale silk-merchant in 
Bos-ton. In three years he had mastered the details of this business, 
and was ready for an honorable competition with his employer. He 
opened a store for himself, and soon became an important merchant. 
He continued in this business until the difficulties with England led to 
the general embargo in December, 1807. This act was carried by re- 
presentations in Congress from the interior and agricultural states. It 
proved most disastrous to the national commerce. By its operation, 
Mr. Dexter, along with many others, was thrown out of employment. 

Mr. Dexter next removed to Berkshire county, and took charge of 
the marble quarries which were then owned and worked by his brother. 
The marble was taken to Hudson, on the North River, and there ship- 
ped for New-York, where it was used for building and other purposes. 
The marble used in erecting the City-Hall of New- York was taken from 
these Berkshire quarries. 

Mr. Dexter's engagement with his brother was not intended to be 
permanent. The prostration of the commerce of the nation had turned 
the public attention to the subject of domestic manufactures. In the 
year 1810, General Humphreys, American Minister in Portugal, im- 
ported three hundred of the finest Merino sheep. These contributed to 
improve the American breed. The raising of the finer grades of wool 
for manufactures promised to become a lucrative business. Mr. Dex- 
ter purchased a farm at Athens, opposite Hudson, and stocked it with 
Merino sheep, which were then very valuable. He had several which 
were thought to be worth $500 each. This agricultural experiment 
served to strengthen his attachment to rural industry. It also gave 
him a ready, unerring insight into the quality of wools, which has since 



822 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

been highly serviceable in the purchase of stock for manufacturing 
cloths. 

In the spring of the year 1815, Mr. Dexter removed from Athens to 
Whitestown, then and still one of the leading towns in Oneida county. 
Here he engaged in mercantile business, and purchased an interest in a 
cotton factory. 

At that time, the machinery for making cotton goods was compara- 
tirely rude and incomplete. The cotton yarn was distributed, in small 
parcels, among the families of the neighborhood, and woven into cloth 
by hand-looms. Six cents per yard was paid for the weaving of cloth 
that sold for twenty-five cents. Cloth of the same quality would now 
bring but five cents. It is by referring to such facts as these, so easily 
forgotten yet so highly significant, that one is brought to realize the 
rapid progress of the age in the industrial arts. 

Mr. Dexter was now thirty-two. Thus far his career had been one of 
various adventure and various success. Yet his future was destined to be 
still more eventful. With full health and high hopes, he awaited its dis- 
closures. In the month of April, 1817, an act was passed by the Legis- 
lature of New-York, which authorized the construction of the Erie and 
Champlain Canals, Mr. Dexter received contracts for making several 
portions of the Erie Canal. The result was probably more advantage- 
ous to the state than to himself. His contracts were faithfully fulfilled, 
and he may have derived some profit from them. It is certain that he 
never applied to the Canal Board, or the Legislature, for extra compen- 
sation. But the most important return came in the shape of experience 
and skill, which fitted him for engaging in other like enterprises with 
greater chances of pecuniary advantage. 

In the year 1824, Mr. Dexter undertook a very heavy contract on 
the Chesapeake and Delaware Canal. This enterprise proved most dis- 
heartening and vexatious, yet ultimately profitable. The country was 
quite unhealthy, and there were many obstacles to be surmounted. 
One of these grew out of the prejudice felt by the good people of De- 
laware and Maryland against all Yankee adventurers and laborers. 

Mr. Dexter commenced, unfortunately, by underletting a large part 
of the work to men. by whom it was re-let at such low rates that the 
sub-contractors were unable to pay their workmen, or the farmers from 
whom supplies were purchased. This brought the whole business into 
such bad odor, that Mr. Dexter was obliged to take back the sub-con- 
tracts and carry on the work himself. So constant and laborious was 
his devotion to the work, and such was his exposure to excessive heat, 
that he was seized with a bilious fever, and for a whole year could do 
nothing. On his recovery, he was released from his contract, and em- 
ployed by the directors, as their agent to carry on the work. This 
arrangement continued for a year, when the work was re-let to him at 
an advanced price, which yielded a satisfactory profit. Afterwards, Mr. 
Dexter built two ship-locks at the Chesapeake end of the canal. These 
contracts, amounted to nearly one million and a half of dollars. The 
work was completed in five years. A series of resolutions was adopted 
by the directors of the canal, in which the energy, perseverance and tact 
exhibited by Mr. Dexter were alluded to in terms ofhigh commendation. 



SIMEON KEWTON DEXTER, OF NEW-YORK. 823 

In January, 1829, Mr. Dexter returned to his home in Whitesboro' with 
a handsome property. While in health, his temperament never allowed 
him to be idle, even for a day. By the success of his last adventure, 
he had fairly secured to himself the privilege of now retiring from ac- 
tive life, and spending the remainder of his years in the enjoyments 
which wealth, well expended, can procure. If such a fancy entered his 
thoughts it was soon dismissed. He chose so to invest his property, 
that it should bring no temptation to idleness ; so that it should benefit 
others as well as himself; so that it should furnish steady employment 
to his less fortunate neighbors, and increase the prosperity of the place 
of his residence. He had been many years a stockholder in the Oris- 
kany Manufacturing Company, whose mills are three miles west of 
Whitesboro', at the confluence of the Oriskany and Mohawk. This 
company was incorporated in 1811, with a capital of ^200,000, subse- 
quently reduced to $110,000, all of which has been paid in. It is be- 
lieved to be the oldest establishment for manufacturing woolen goods 
in the United States. The idea of commencing this business originated 
with Doctor Seth Capron, an officer of the Revolutionary army, two of 
whose sons are now among the most successful of American manufac- 
'turers. On the list of original stockholders are found the names of 
Ambrose Spencer, Jonas Piatt, Thomas K. Gold, De Witt Clinton, 
Theodore Sill, Newton Mann, William G. Tracy, Stephen Van liens- 
selaer and G. G. Lansing. The enterprise was embarked in by these 
patriotic men, less with the expectation of pecuniary profit than with 
the hope of doing something to render their country independent of 
England. The satinets first made by this company sold readily for 
84 per yard, and their broadcloths from $10 to 812 per yard; but to 
counterbalance these prices an average of 81 12 per lb. was paid for 
wool for several years. The first agent of the Oriskany Company was 
Colonel Garret G. Lansing, an officer in the Continental army ; the 
second was Dr. Seth Capron; the third, George Hutton; the fourth, 
Horace Hunt ; the fifth, S. Newton Dexter. 

At the time of Mr. Dexter's return from Delaware, the Oriskany 
Company was so embarrassed in its afiairs, and so deeply involved in 
debt, as to be on the verge of bankruptcy. Its friends believed that Mr. 
Dexter was the man to restore its credit and prosperity. He was ap- 
pointed agent for the company. His first act in its service was the 
loaning of 825,000, from his own resources, for the payment of debts, 
and the purchase of new and improved machinery. The confidence of 
the public was soon regained. A new and hopeful spirit was infused 
into the operations of the company. Its fabrics won for themselves a 
good name and a quick demand in the market. Old debts were extin- 
guished, new buildings were erected ; and the village of Oriskany, with 
the woolen mills for its heart, became a busy and thriving place. The 
company now employ 120 hands, consume 220,000 pounds of wool an- 
nually, and manufacture 110,000 yards of broadcloths and tweeds. 

The " Dexter Manufacturing Company" was organized in 1832, with 
an actual capital of about 850,000, most of which was furnished by the 
subject of this notice. Its buildings are located a mile from Oriskany, 
in the village of Pleasant Valley. It now employs 110 hands, and con- 
sumes 175,000 pounds of wool annually in the manufacture of first-class 



824 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

broadcloths, tweeds, and shawls. The management of the affairs of this 
company was recently transferred from the original agent to his son, 
Andrew Dexter, Esq., by whom the business is conducted with great 
prudence and foresight. 

At the annual fair of the American Institute for 1852, a sample of 
beaver cloths was exhibited by the Dexter Manufacturing Company, for 
which a gold medal was awarded. These goods were not made for 
show, but were taken at random from a case sent to the company's 
agent in New-York. 

In some respects, Pleasant Valley deserves to be mentioned as a 
model village of its kind. Most of the dwellings are owned by the 
company, and there is not a bar or a dram-shop within its bounds. It 
is fast increasing and improving. The residence of Mr. West, the su- 
perintendent, and of Mr. Bowes, are tastefully built. The well-kept 
grounds about them furnish pleasant evidence that their owners know 
how to appreciate the beautiful in nature. 

In addition to these establishments, which have fallen under his more 
immediate supervision, Mr. Dexter is largely interested in various other 
manufacturing companies located in Oneida and Jefferson counties. 
His last enterprise of this kind was the erection of a woolen factory at* 
Elgin, 111., which has already created a desirable market for the farmers 
in its vicinity. Its business is now under the oversight of Mr. Reuben 
L. Yarwood. 

Truth requires it to be confessed that Mr. Dexter was once engaged 
in the making of whisky. It is to his credit, that he hurried out of the 
business, at a heavy sacrifice, as soon as he became conscious of its evil 
tendency. About the year 1821, a temperance society was organized in 
Whitesboro', of which he became the first president. He not only gave 
up manufacturing whisky, but refused to sell or lease his distillery. The 
copper stills were taken out, and applied to a useful purpose in the 
Oriskany factory. The building itself was suffered to go to decay ; and 
no part of its machinery, with the consent or knowledge of its owner, 
was afterwards used for manufacturing alcohol. 

When temperance societies were first organized, the members simply 
pledged themselves to abstain from ardent spirits. It was not long be- 
fore Mr. Dexter discovered the defect and inconsistency of this pledge. 
His feelings became deeply enlisted in an effort to rescue a fellow- 
townsman from going down to the drunkard's grave. It was said to 
Mr. Dexter, in reply to his warnings, " You are in the same boat with 
myself. You are a rich man, and drink your wine : I am a poor man, 
and can afford nothing costlier than whisky. Both will intoxicate ; and 
if I am in peril, so are you." Mr. Dexter then drew up a pledge of 
total abstinence from all intoxicating drinks, which both parties signed. 
The man thus saved from ruin has continued sober to this day, and has 
accumulated considerable property. This incident would be less worthy 
of notice, had it not occurred before the pledge of total abstinence was 
adopted by temperance societies. 

In 1835, Mr. Dexter accepted an invitation to occupy a seat in the 
board of trustees of Hamilton College. This institution was chartered 
in 1812, and is located at Clinton, seven miles from Whitesboro'. At 
the time of Mr. Dexter's appointment as a trustee, it was emerging 



SIMEON NEWTON DEXTER, OF NEW-TORK. 825 

from a series of embarrassments, which had greatly lessened its revenue 
and crippled its usefulness. An appeal in its behalf had been recently 
made, by which was secured a permanent fund of $40,000 for the sup- 
port of instructors. The wants of the college had been remembered in 
the will of Hon. William H. Maynard, who died in 1832, and be- 
queathed to it an endowment for a profession of law and history. Mr. 
Maynard's example was improved upon by Mr. Dexter. What the 
former did by testament, the latter chose to do by an immediate dona- 
tion. The sum of $15,000 was presented for endowing the professor- 
ship of classical literature. This department is supposed to have been 
chosen as the object of his munificence, not more on account of its ac- 
knowledged importance in a collegiate institution, than on account of 
his esteem for the learning and piety of its then incumbent, the Rev. 
Dr. North, who has since been promoted to the presidency. 

In devoting a portion of his property to the advancement of learning, 
while yet in the prime of his years, Mr. Dexter exhibited a liberality 
worthy of the highest praise from all, and of imitation from those of 
sufficient means. Giving to a literary or a benevolent institution is 
one of the surest ways of perpetuating the blessing that there is in 
wealth without its evil. If the good that men do is ever " interred 
with their bones," it must be good of a different kind from the endow- 
ment of professorships and charities. 

hi 1838, what is known as the " general banking law," was passed by 
the legislature of New-York. The Bank of Whitestown was among the 
first to deposit with the controller the required securities, and to issue 
notes under the provisions of this law. Mr. Dexter was elected its 
first president, and has been retained in the office ever since. The 
affairs of the association have been so carefully managed as to secure a 
high degree of confidence and prosperity. Although the mercantile 
business of the village is quite limited, the annual dividends of the bank 
have never fallen below eight per cent., and for two years past they 
have risen to ten per cent. The first cashier was James S. Thomas, 
now of Brockport ; the present is Israel J. Gray. 

It would be impossible that a man of Mr. Dexter's temperament and 
experience should not feel a deep interest in the management of our 
public affairs. After having suffered so much in the past from disas- 
trous legislation, and having staked so much in his present investments, 
a feeling of indifference to the national policy would be infatuation. 
Yet it cannot be said that the shape of his political sentiments has been 
determined wholly or even chiefly by interested motives. His early 
associations brought him into frequent contact with those good and 
great statesmen whose talents and virtues moulded public opinion dur- 
ing the purer days of our republic. His sympathies have always been 
on the side of a broad, national and conservative policy. Like Hard- 
castle in "She Stoops to Conquer," he "loves everything that's old; 
old friends, old times, old manners, old books." He is cautious about 
deserting those landmarks which the experience of the past has fixed. 
At the same time, he is no enemy to what is new, if it be only recom- 
mended by something less deceptive than its novelty. He believes 
that the legislation of the country has been obstinately hostile to the 
manufacturing interest, and indirectly to the agricultural. Yet he 



I 



826 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

loves his country, with all the faults of its government. It might be 
said of him, as was said of his uncle, Samuel Dexter, by Judge Story, 
that "he considers the union of the states as the security of their 
liberties: whatever might be his opinion of any measures, he never 
breathed a doubt to shake public or private confidence in the excel- 
lence of the constitution." 

It is quite likely that Mr. Dexter may have been strengthened in his 
attachment to the constitution by his friendship and admiration for 
Henry Wheaton and Daniel Webster. The former was one of the 
playmates and schoolmates of his boyhood. Almost the earliest of his 
recollections is that of making " mud-pies" with him in the streets of 
Providence. His acquaintance with the latter commenced, when both 
were young men, in the following way : His eldest brother, Andrew 
Dexter, was an extensive operator in Boston. In transacting his busi- 
ness he had occasion to use large banking facilities. It was partly 
through his own, and partly through Mr. Webster's influence, that a 
charter was obtained from the legislature of New-Hampshire for a new 
bank at Concord. Mr. Webster was appointed attorney for the bank ; 
and when its operations were about to commence, he came to Boston 
to obtain the amount of specie required by the act of incorporation. 
The specie was obtained, and, for greater security, Mr. Dexter accom- 
panied Mr. Webster on his return to Concord. They left Boston with 
a good span of horses and a trusty driver. A shower came up soon 
after they started, and at nightfall they found themselves in the most 
dreary part of Chester woods. To crown their trouble, the carriage 
broke down, and they were compelled to leave their money in charge 
of the driver, and finish their journey on foot. After a long and tedi- 
ous walk in the rain and darkness, they reached a tavern, kept by a Mr. 
Head, at the east end of the bridge over the Merrimack River. The 
evening was now well advanced, and a lively dance was going forward 
in Head's ball-room. A party was sent back to relieve the driver and 
secure the specie. Mr. Webster and his friend forgot their weariness 
at the voice of the violin. They were urged to accept the loan of slip- 
pers, and entered heartily into the spirit of the occasfon. Mr. Web- 
ster was well known. Nothing could be more agreeable to the girls 
than the addition to their company of a talented lawyer and a Boston 
merchant. They danced all night, and the next day deposited their 
specie in the new bank of Concord. Mr. Webster afterwards collected 
notes for Mr. Dexter in New-Hampshire, and their friendship continued, 
without interruption, until the death of the former. 

In the county of Oneida, the party with which Mr. Dexter sympa- 
thizes has never been really and unquestionably dominant. It has some- 
times won a temporary or partial success when the opposing party was 
divided, or when influences of an unusual sort were brought into play. 
Under these circumstances, the leading of forlorn hopes is one of the 
duties to which a prominent and patriotic citizen is occasionally sum- 
moned. Mr. Dexter has submitted to his share of this barren honor 
along with other leaders of his party — along with such men as Charles 
P. Kirkland, Fortune C. White, and Joshua A. Spencer. As a candi- 
date for the office of sheriff, and afterwards for that of representative in 
Congress, he has been assured, by handsome, complimentary votes, that 



SIMEON NEWTON DEXTER, OF NEW-TQEK. 827 

he was fully confided in by those within the pale of his party. Mr. Dexter 
had served his town as a member of the Board of Supervisors for Oneida 
county. By the constitution of New- York, this body is intrusted with 
powers which render the office of supervisor one of honor and respon- 
sibility. 

In Jan., 1850, the control of the state government of New- York fell 
into the hands of the whigs. This control embraced the executive depart- 
ment and both branches of the legislature. • Never before had the whigs 
held a majority in the Senate since the year 1818. On the 13th Feb- 
ruary, 1840, Asa Whitney, S. Newton Dexter, David Hudson, George 
N. Boughton, and Henry Hamilton, were appointed canal commis- 
sioners, by a concurrent resolution, in the place of Samuel Young, John 
Bowman, William C. Bouck, Jonas Earll, and William Baker. Samuel 
B, Ruggles, a whig, had been previously appointed to fill a vacancy. 

It has been reported that, at the legislative caucus by which the new 
commissioners were nominated, many of the members were in favor of 
retaining Mr. Bouck, under the impression that his experience and 
practical knowledge would be absolutely indispensable. This appre- 
hension was removed when the character of the gentlemen who were to 
compose the whig board came to be fully understood. They were men 
of active habits, of ready business tact ; and one of them, at least, could 
bring to the discharge of his official duties a practical familiarity with 
the building and management of canals. 

Mr. Dexter was chosen one of the acting commissioners, and was 
charged with the especial oversight of the Chenango and Black River 
Canals, and the Middle Division of the Erie. This was before the 
Stop-Law was passed, and immense sums were expended by the com- 
missioners on the Erie enlargement, and on the construction of the 
Black River Canal. Contracts were then made by a single commis- 
sioner, and for very large amounts. Yet these officers were never ac- 
cused of favoritism or mismanagement. It was never complained that 
they consulted for the promotion of any interest beneath that of the 
state and the people, in discharging the onerous duties of their trust. 

Mr. Dexter found that his private business was suffering from his de- 
votion to that of the state, and at the end of two years was quite thank- 
ful to be released from the burdens of office. 

In 1840, a peculiar malady, known as the "Plank-road Fever," 
seized upon the people of Central New-York. It was brought on by a 
set of captivating estimates prepared and published by Hon. George 
Geddes, of Onondaga county. A general plank-road law was hurried 
through the forms of legislation, and, under its provisions, a good many 
associations sprang into action. Immense quantities of timber were 
swept from the forests, and old-established turnpikes were broken up. 

Mr. Dexter cannot boast that he was much behind his fellow-citizens 
in zeal to try the plank-road experiment. He was one of an association 
formed for planking the road from Utica to Rome, and was elected its 
first president. The eastern half of the route is much traveled, and the 
investment is probably as good as the best of its kind. 

In 1830, Mr. Dexter was appointed one of the managers of the State 
Lunatic Asylum, at Utica, and still holds the office. Dr. N. D. Bene- 



828 RETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

diet is well known as the able and faithful superintendent of this insti- 
tution. 

It is sometimes the case with those who are engaged in heavy busi- 
ness operations, that they lose their relish for the pure pleasures to be 
drawn from intimacy with literature, and art, and nature. AVhen the 
accumulation of money is pursued exclusively and devotedly, there is 
danger that the excitement of the chase will become the main motive 
for its continuance. If the*money-maker is in too great haste to be 
rich, there is danger that he will become blunted as to his sensibilities, 
so that property will be sought for its own sake, and for the pleasure of 
its seeking, rather than from the ennobling means of enjoyment which 
it can command. 

No such misfortune has fallen upon the subject of this sketch. He 
not only knows how to make money, but how to use it. 

To one who was familiar with the extent and variety of his pecuniary 
transactions, but unacquainted with his habits of reading and his ready 
appreciation of literary merit, his library is so large that it might seem 
to have been collected more for ornament than for use. Such a con- 
clusion would be entirely wrong. While watching the ebb and flow 
of tides in the market, the rising and setting of stars in the political 
sky, he keeps himself well read in the master-pieces of English litera- 
ture. With a keen zest he follows out the development of a political 
crisis in Hume, or Alison, Macauley, or Michelet : or the unraveling of a 
domestic intrigue in Shakspeare, or Scott, or Thackeray. His walls, 
hung with canvas made life-like and eloquent by the genius of Stuart 
and Fisher, and Morse, witness the presence of a genuine love of art, 
as well as an eye skilled to detect and prefer its finest exhibitions. His 
large, well-kept garden, in which the sun so often greets him at its rising 
and setting, witnesses a fondness for rural industry. 

Mr. Dexter is a communicant and senior warden of the Episcopalian 
Church in Whitesboro'. Yet his religious sympathies are bounded by 
no sectarian limits. He enjoys a good sermon equally well, whether 
the preacher wears a coat or a gown. He admires the man whose life 
is Christ-like, without stopping to ask whether he receives the sacra- 
ment from a deacon sitting, or from a priest kneeling. He attends 
frequently the services of the Presbyterian Church, and gives liberally 
for the support of its pastor. 

Mr. Dexter has been twice married. His first wife was Laura Nor- 
thrup, eldest daughter of Hon. Isaac Northrup, of Athens, N. Y., a man 
of property and stainless integrity. She died, December 10, 1846. 
By his first wife his children were four. Two of them, a son and a 
daughter survive, and are married. His second and present wife was 
Mrs. Martha Raymond Gold, 






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WEST U. HUMPHREYS, OF TENNESSEE. 829 



WEST H. HUMPHREYS, 



OF TENNESSEE. 



The subject of this notice was born in the county of Montgomery, 
Tennessee, on the 26th of August, 1806. His paternal grandfather 
was a silversmith, of Welsh descent, who removed from the city of 
Richmond, Virginia, to Lexington, Kentucky, at an early period in the 
history of that latter state. One of his sons. Parry Wayne Humphreys 
was educated, carefully for that period, for the bar, and having studied 
law in the office of James Hughes, his brother-in-law, he came to Nash- 
ville in 1801, where he obtained license to practice law. In 1804, he 
was married to Mary West, the daughter of a farmer in Montgomery 
county — a lady of exemplary piety and domestic worth. The subject 
of this notice was their eldest child. Parry W. Humphreys having 
filled the various stations of Member of the Legislature, Member of 
Congress, Commissioner for the settlement of disputed boundaries be- 
tween Kentucky and Tennessee, Judge of the Superior Court and of 
the Circuit Court, died in 1839, leaving a character unsurpassed for 
modesty and benevolence in private life, and for dignity and impartial- 
ity on the bench. At an early period he paid especial attention to the 
education of his eldest son. He gave him all the advantages that the 
best schools of the day could furnish, and, at a more advanced period, 
sent him to Transylvania university, then under the presidency of Dr. 
Holly. That institution was, at that time, thronged with students col- 
lected from all parts of the western country, under the spirited admin- 
istration of that celebrated teacher. Ambition was there excited in the 
bosoms of the youthful votaries of science and literature to the highest 
pitch ; and under studies severely pursued, the health of young Hum- 
phreys gave way. and he was forced to leave the university. Under 
the apprehension of a permanent affection of the liver, he was sent to 
the South for the recovery of his health. The trip proving beneficial, 
but not effecting a radical restoration, his attendance at classical schools 
was broken and occasional only. He finished his education in the 
schools of Montgomery county, having pursued the usual course of 
studies, and acquired a respectable knowledge of the Greek, Latin and 
French languages. Having access at all times to an extensive and 
well selected library in his father's office, he acquired in early life aa 
inveterate habit of reading, and a taste for history, poetry and general 
literature. 

[n his nineteenth year, Mr. Humphreys commenced the study of the 
law in his father's office. He there pored over the pages of the same 
copy of Blackstone which had passed through the hands of Cave Johnson, 
W. Fitzgerald, N. H. Allen, D. Fentress, and others, who have since 
occupied positions of distinction at the bar, and in the state and national 
governments. His habits of study, like those whilst at college, were 
severe and injurious to his health, but rather irregular and discursive, 



830 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS 

seeking such branches of the law as suited his taste, rather than evinc- 
ing a systematic pursuit of it as a science. 

After having spent a year in study in his father's office, where nis 
health was sustained by the occasional pursuit of game, gun in hand, in 
the wilds of Yellow Creek, he repaired to the office of Foster and Fogg, 
then, as now, distinguished members of the bar at Nashville. lie there 
continued his studies some four or five months, but not with so much 
advantage as in the solitudes of the country. He left Nashville and 
attended a course of law lectures delivered by Charles Humphreys in 
Lexington, Kentucky, and returned to Tennessee, where he obtained a 
license to practice law in 1828, 

Having resided successively in the towns of Charlotte and Clarks- 
»ille, and having succeeded in obtaining a fair share of professional 
emolument and character, without delay or difficulty, but finding the 
practice of the law before his father, then a judge, unpleasant to both, 
he removed to Fayette county. He arrived at Somerville, the county 
seat, in August, 1832, a small village in the western division of the state. 
This division of the state had been purchased of the Indians in 1819, 
and, in 1832, many of them were still in the counties of the state of 
Mississippi adjoining Fayette. The court-house was about fifteen feet 
square, and was constructed of oak poles. The bench, which consisted 
of some loose planks fastened up about four feet above the floor, was 
occupied by the late W. B. Turley, subsequently so much distinguished 
as a judge of the Supreme Court. The lawyers and jury were seated 
on similar erections, and the spectators were looking on through the 
cracks of this temple of justice. Such was the state of things, in 1832, 
in one of the counties of the state, now amongst its most wealthy and en- 
lightened, and under such circumstances was justice ably and impartial- 
ly administered. Mr Humphreys formed a partnership with D. 
Fentress, Esq., a lawyer of distinction. Being an efficient advocate, 
and having acquired a habit of thoroughly investigating the law, and 
especially the facts of his cases, he soon obtained a lucrative practice. 
His style of speaking being earnest and vehement, argumentative and 
unaffected, he impressed courts and juries strongly with the vigor of 
his thoughts and the correctness of his conclusions. His liberality iu 
regard to pleadings, (a merit at that time,) his courtesy in debate and 
his rigid abstinence from all attacks on the motives of opposing law- 
yers, secured him the esteem of the great body of his professional 
brethren. He treated the court with respect, no matter what might be 
his opinion of the course of the judge. In a few years he acquired a 
commanding popularity, not merely in the county of his residence but 
in the counties in which he practiced law. 

In 1834, Mr. Humphreys was brought forward for the office of de- 
legate to the convention' which had been previously called to revise 
and amend the constitution of the state. The leading features in the 
then existing constitution which created dissatisfaction were the taxa- 
tion of land by the acre instead of by value, which operated oppres- 
sively and unequally on poorer lands and poorer counties; and the 
mode of electing the officers and their term of office. Mr. Humphreys 
had, in early life, been an admirer of the political course of Thomas 
Jefferson, and had read and studied his works with the most careful at- 



WEST n. HUMPHREYS, OF TENNESSEE. 831 

tention. He had adopted the views of that statesman with regard to 
the best mode of electing judicial officers and their tenure of service. 
On taking the field, he declared himself in favor of specific and limited 
terms of service for all officers, leaving them subject to re-election, and 
in favor of the election of judges, attorneys-general, magiBkrates, and 
county officers generally, by popular vote. These views met with the 
most violent and determined opposition. He was opposed by two 
highly respectable and influential candidates. He was, however, elect- 
ed, and appeared in May, 1834, in the convention at Nashville, the 
youngest member in the body. " You have sent us here," said a most 
distinguished member of that body to a citizen of Fayette county, "a 
young gentlemen of excellent habits and fine attainments; but I differ 
with him toto coelo as to the election of judges by the people." 

It is not necessary to review the course of Mr. Humphreys in the 
convention. It was modest and unobtrusive. He advocated with con- 
sistency and ability the principles on which he had been elected ; and 
during an arduous session of many months, he advanced, day by day, 
in the good opinion of the members of the body, and established 
friendships of the most permanent character, which were of great value 
to him in afler life, and which have not been extinguished in the colli- 
sions of party conflicts. 

Mr. Humphreys is the author of many provisions in the constitution 
of Tennessee, which have proved of lasting and permanent benefit ; such 
as the prohibition of lotteries, the prohibition of divorce by legislative 
action, and a reference of such questions for settlement to the judicial 
tribunals of the state, the establishment of a uniform rate of interest, 
and provisions for the purpose of curtailing, generally, local and private 
legislation. His reports, as chairman of the committee on private and 
local legislation, will be found at pages 155 and 190 of the journal of 
the convention, and exhibit much soundness of judgment and maturity 
of thought. 

On his return to his constituents, Mr. Humphreys found them satis- 
fied with his course. The charges of demagogism and insincerity, 
which had been freely lavished on him during the canvass, had been 
silenced by the ability with which he had maintained his views, and the 
general character for rectitude of motive and business habits which he 
had established. Though he stood in a feeble minority on the question 
of submitting to popular vote the election of judges, he has lived to 
witness the passage of resolutions by the legislature, recommending 
that mode of election with extraordinary unanimity. 

The organization of the state government under the reformed consti- 
tution next occupied the attention of the public mind, and excited the 
deepest interest ; and the great body of the men who have since occu- 
pied the most conspicuous positions in the state government and in the 
national government from Tennessee, were called into the succeeding le- 
gislature by the popular voice. Mr. Humphreys was elected from the 
county of Fayette without opposition. It was in this body that he was 
first required by his position to take an active participation in national 
politics. He had been educated a strict constructionist of the consti- 
tution of the United States, and was a sincere adherent to the leading 
measures of democratic policy. He had advocated the selection of a 



832 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

presidential candidate by a national convention ; and the friends of 
Judge White placing him in opposition to that course, and advocating 
his nomination by the legislature on grounds hostile, as he believed, to 
the permanence of democratic policy, he opposed that nomination in a 
feeble minority of nine out of seventy-five members of the lower 
house, in a speech of great ability, which has been often since referred 
to as evidence of the sagacity which foreshadowed the disruption of the 
democratic party in Tennessee. But, whilst Mr. Humphreys sustained 
the general course of the party to which he belonged, he showed his 
independence by his refusal to indorse, indiscriminately, all the mea- 
sures of General Jackson's administration. Whilst he advocated the 
great doctrine of free trade, and opposed the creation of a national 
bank, and internal improvements by the general government, he sus- 
tained the construction of such improvements by individual enterprise, 
aided by the credit and resources of the state government. 

The inability of individuals, unaided and alone, to construct great 
lines of communication, led Mr. Humphreys at an early period to see 
the necessity of giving aid by the state to such works, with a view to 
develop the resources of an interior state, and made him the fiist advo- 
cate of a restricted and moderate system of state aid ; and an elaborate 
speech of his, published in the journals of that day, exhibit the 
views which he has constantly upheld as necessary to the advancement 
and prosperity of his native state, until the important connections shall 
be fully established, and private capital be sufficient to accomplish 
what remains. A fixed belief in the inherent right tendencies of man, 
and in his capacity for indefinite progression, and in the organization of 
physical nature for unmixed good, is the foundation of his code of 
morals and industrial policy, and has placed him at all times unobstru- 
sively in the advance guard of reform and progress. 

The situation of Mr. Humphreys in the legislature of 1837-38, in a 
feeble minority, was not favorable for placing him prominently before 
the public as the organ of committees or the author of reports. He, 
however, sought no prominence, and was content to speak only when 
occasion required, and when something in which he had an abiding 
interest was brought forward; and then the sincerity of his convictions 
was impressed on others in the most unmistakable manner. 

Mr. Humphreys left the Legislature, as he had done the Constitu- 
tional Convention, with a character for acting always in fidelity to the 
convictions of his understanding, and for usefulness, increased and ex- 
tended. Amidst the heated collisions of party, he retained the esteem 
of opposing partisans. 

Before the next general election came on,- the banks of the (Tnited 
States suspended specie payments, and amidst the pecuniary disasters 
of that period the tide of public opinion in Tennessee turned violently 
against those who had acted in hostility to the United States Bank. Mr. 
Humphreys, in common with the great body of the leading men hold- 
ing the same views, was defeated as a candidate for re-election. He 
returned to his profession and entered upon its duties. 

In January, 1830, Mr. Humphreys was married, at Nashville, to 
Miss Amanda M. Pillow. This put an end to all connection with 
politics. • 



WEST H. HUMPHREYS, OF TENNESSEE, 833 

At the organization of the state government under the revised con- 
stitution, the legislature enacted a law establishing the office of attor- 
ney-general for the state, and reporter of decisions of the Supreme 
Court. The attorney-general for the state was required to prosecute 
and defend for the state in all cases coming to the Supreme Court by 
appeal, in which the state is interested, either civil or criminal. He 
was required by law to give written opinions to the governor, con- 
troller, secretary of state, and certain other officers, when called on. 
He was subsequently constituted a member of the board of internal 
improvements, and required by statute to protect and guard the inter- 
ests of the state in those chartered companies in which the state owned 
stock. This statute also required the clerks of the Supreme Court to 
furnish the reporter with copies of the written opinions of the court, and 
the records ; and from them the reporter is required to prepare his 
reports of cases and furnish the state printer with the manuscripts. 

In 1839, Mr. Humphreys was elected, by the legislature, to this 
station. James K. Polk was then governor of the state ; and it was 
during the administration of the state government by him that Mr, 
Humphreys first contracted an intimate personal acquaintance with him 
and also with General Jackson. In the last litigations in which these 
distinguished citizens were engaged, Mr. Humphreys was their at 
torney. 

At the expiration of six years, in 1844, Mr. Humphreys was re 
elected, and his second term expired on the 10th of December, 1851 
when he notified the court of the fact, and moved that his successor take 
the oaths of office, which was done, and Mr. Humphreys retired from 
office in accordance with an intention long previously expressed, and 
rendered necessary by impaired health. 

With regard to the manner in which he discharged the duties of the 
office of attorney-general, it is sufficient to remark, that he passed 
through the ordeal of twelve years' service without a suspicion having 
attached to his integrity and conscientious discharge of duty. He did 
not blindly insist on convictions in all cases, but exercised a discrimi- 
nating judgment which showed that justice, and the interests of the state, 
rather than the ambition of success, governed his conduct. 

A distinguished member of the Tennessee bar, (the late Thomas H. 
Fletcher,) said of Mr. Humphreys, "that his courteous deportment and 
his uniform respect for the rights of defendants deserved to be emula- 
ted." In the prosecution of cases of deep interest, when his judgment 
satisfied him of the guilt of the defendant, his researches were commen- 
surate with the magnitude of the case, and his efforts vigorous and 
effective. 

The eleven volumes of reports which ilr. Humphreys has prepared 
for the press are before the country, and will speak for themselves. 
Taken as a whole, they have satisfied the profession of the state where 
they were issued, and may be regarded as a well-prepared and valuable 
addition to the law reports of the United States. 

For the last two years, Mr. Humphreys has been engaged, in the in- 
terval of official engagements, in the support of rail-road legislation and 
rail-road enterprises, and in the attempt to reorganize the judiciary of 

53 



834 SKETCHES OF EMINENT AMERICANS. 

this state, and introduce a reformed system of pleadings and practice. 
He is a member of no church, and whilst he is tolerant in his feelings 
to all shades of religious opinions, his tendencies and sympathies, like 
those of his father and paternal uncle, are towards Unitarianism. 

Mr. Humphreys is now in the prime of life, and the writer of this 
sketch anticipates for him many years of increasing usefulness. 



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